There’s a lot of conflicting nutrition information out there which can make food decisions challenging. As a parent, the pressure mounts even higher because naturally, you want to do what’s best for your kids so that they grow up healthy and strong. Nutrition plays a big part in that and so does their relationship with food. But how do you teach a child to have a healthy relationship with food?

We explore this question and more on this episode of DataDish, with Anne Mauney. Anne is a Washington, D.C.-based Registered Dietitian Nutritionist. She also has a Master’s of Public Health in Nutrition from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Anne works with clients using a method called Intuitive Eating, helping them to improve their relationship with food and reduce the associated stress that some people experience.

Some highlights from today’s episode include:

• What shapes our perception of food? Our childhood has a big impact on how we eat later in life, and parents play a role in that development.
• What does it mean to have a healthy relationship with food? Two key ideas include not labeling foods as “good” or “bad” and not allowing food to take up too much mental space.
• Why is it important for kids in particular to have a good relationship with food? The habits and perceptions kids learn when they’re young builds the foundation for their relationship with food later in life.
• How do you advise parents to help kids build a healthy relationship with food? Anne references Ellyn Satter’s division of responsibility, which states that parents are responsible for what, when and where the child is offered food while the child is in control of how much food they eat and whether or not they eat.

Enjoy the podcast! To learn more about intuitive eating, check out more of these Food Insight resources.