Picky Eaters Could Be Showing Signs Of Depression, Other Disorders [Study]

Picky eaters are tough to deal with when it comes to sitting at the table, but they could be showing signs of depression with their behavior in certain extreme cases, a new study says.

The interesting findings that link picky eaters with depression in extreme cases were published Monday in the journal Pediatrics. In addition, picky eaters could suffer from ADHD and social anxiety, according to the research.

The study was conducted on 917 children — between the ages of two and six — who were brought in to Duke University for routine medical check-ups. It’s not new information that some kids are extremely picky eaters, but researchers found that when they have limited options at home, things get very difficult and going out to dine is almost impossible.

Cases of extremely picky eaters were very low in the study, three-percent of all kids surveyed. However, that small group was twice as likely as kids who weren’t picky eaters to be diagnosed with depression and seven times as likely to suffer from social anxiety, researchers concluded.

The director of the Duke Center for Eating Disorders and head researcher, Nancy Zucker, recommends parents of extremely picky eaters seek help, as the children are unlikely to outgrow their behavior on their own. Even if they improve, it can become disruptive while eating with the family or company.

As to what to do with the 17-percent of kids that are not extreme picky eaters, but still make meals an unpleasant event, Zucker had some interesting things to contribute.

“They’re more sensitive to taste, to smell, to texture, to visual clues like light. They also had higher levels of anxiety symptoms and depressive symptoms.”

However — and this is very important — these symptoms didn’t result in a formal diagnosis, Zucker says, “which is important to stress because I really don’t want to cause panic among parents.”

According to Zucker, those children with sensitivities to foods could “have a potentially richer, more vivid life experience, but it could be a vulnerability if it crosses a threshold where it starts to impair them.”

In some of these instances children also had more family conflicts in relation to food, and mothers with higher anxiety, due to the stress of having a picky eater. Additionally, certain kids were so repulsed by food others were eating that it made it impossible to join with them.

Zucker suggests introducing new foods at snack time, as to avoid battling a picky eater during family meal times. It may take up to eight tries, but eventually most kids will learn to accept new foods.

For parents, this may be an eye-opening study and will help them realize that maybe their child isn’t just a picky eater to make their lives miserable, but could be suffering from an underlying problem.

[Image via Shutterstock]

Picky Eaters Could Be Showing Signs Of Depression, Other Disorders [Study] is an article from: The Inquisitr News

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