Child feeding practice, picky eating behaviour and nutritional status among toddlers in West Java, Indonesia

Abstract

Background: Nutritional problems in toddlers in Indonesia are still a serious concern considering that this age group is vulnerable to nutritional problems that cannot be corrected as before, thus having an impact on the growth and development process.

Purpose: To determine the association between feeding practice and picky eating behaviour with the nutritional status of toddlers in Sukamulya Village.

Method:Correlational quantitative research design. The data used comes from secondary data. The sample was 145 mothers with toddlers in Sukamulya Village. Data analysis used univariate analysis and bivariate analysis with the Spearman's rho correlation test.

Results: Most of the feeding practices carried out by mothers in Sukamulya Village are proper (94.5%). Regarding food choice behaviour, there were 73 toddlers (50.3%) who were not picky eating and 72 (49.7%) toddlers who were picky eating. The nutritional status of toddlers in Sukamulya Village consists of 92 toddlers (63.4%) in the good nutritional status category, 28 toddlers (19.3%) are at risk of overweight, 12 toddlers (8.3%) were overweight, 8 toddlers (5.5%) were obese, 3 toddlers (2.1%) experienced severely wasted and 2 toddlers (1.4%) were wasted.

Conclusion: There is no significant association between maternal feeding practice (r= -0.007; p= 0.936) and picky eating behaviour (r= -0.010; p=0.907) with the nutritional status of toddlers in Sukamulya Village.

Suggestion: It is expected that the results of this study will be useful as a reference for the latest data related to toddler nutrition so that it can be a basis for improving health services and can provide direction in the form of counselling or education related to maternal feeding practices and monitoring toddler behaviour in children to optimize toddler health conditions.