PAREAT · Pediatric Avoidant and Restrictive Eating: A biopsychosocial investigation
Horizon 2020 — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions
- Duration
- 2020-04-01 → 2023-10-29
- EU contribution
- €203,149
- Participants
- 1
- Scheme
- MSCA-IF
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Results in brief
Pediatric Avoidant and Restrictive Eating: A biopsychosocial investigation
Avoidant Restrictive Food Intake Disorder (ARFID) is a psychological disorder that was first introduced in 2013 in the Diagnostic and Statistical manual of Mental Disorders- 5th edition. ARFID is characterized by the consumption of a limited quantity or range of foods not due to weight or shape concerns, that results in failure to meet nutritional needs, poor growth, and/or significant psychosocial impairment. While ARFID may affect up to 3% of children, between 13-34% of young children engage in avoidant/restrictive eating that does not meet full criteria for ARFID, making it a significant public health problem. Patients with ARFID most commonly engage in restrictive eating due to a combination of presumed sensory sensitivity to food qualities (e.g., taste, smell, texture), low interest in food/appetite, and/or fear of adverse consequences of eating (e.g., choking, vomiting, pain). A recent attempt to inform the pathophysiology of ARFID has been made through the Three-Dimensional Neurobiological Model of ARFID (Thomas et al., 2017) which posits that these symptom dimension can co-occur and are rooted in dimension-specific biological vulnerabilities. As ARFID symptoms are first identified in early childhood, it is essential to gain a deeper understanding of biological vulnerabilities for ARFID in early childhood and how they interact with social factors in ARFID etiology to develop effective and efficient interventions for affected children and their families. The aims of this project are to 1) identify biological vulnerabilities for the sensory sensitivity and fear dimensions of avoidant/restrictive eating in early childhood and 2) test how a child’s biological vulnerabilities are exacerbated or remediated by parent feeding behavior in relation to the child’s ARFID symptoms.
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
Avoidant Restrictive Food Intake Disorder (ARFID) is a newly defined psychological disorder that is estimated to affect ~5% of children. Children with ARFID eat a limited quantity or range of foods due to sensory sensitivity to the food (i.e., taste, smell, texture, temperature, appearance), low interest/appetite, fear of adverse consequences of eating (e.g., choking, vomiting, pain), or a combination of these reasons. ARFID causes children to have significant nutritional deficiencies, growth impairment and/or significant psychosocial problems. However, little is known about what causes ARFID, particularly in early childhood when symptoms typically begin. A recent attempt to inform the pathophysiology of ARFID has been made through the introduction of the Three-Dimensional Neurobiological Model of ARFID, but this model has yet to be evaluated in early childhood. Given the powerful effect of parent feeding behavior on early childhood eating, it is essential to understand how parent feeding behavior interacts with a child’s biological vulnerabilities for ARFID to develop effective behavioral interventions for ARFID in early childhood. I will extend my research on child anxiety, parenting behavior and psychophysiological assessment, while obtaining essential training in the etiology and biology of feeding and eating disorders and emotional processing of food stimuli to conduct the first evaluation of the interaction of biological risks and parenting behavior on ARFID symptoms in young children. In a sample of 60 children ages 4-7 years (30 with avoidant/restrictive eating and 30 typically developing controls), I will 1) identify biological vulnerabilities for the sensory sensitivity and fear dimensions of avoidant/restrictive eating and 2) test the interaction of parent factors and biological vulnerabilities on the severity of symptoms in the sensory sensitivity and fear of aversive consequences dimensions of avoidant/restrictive eating.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- UNIVERSITE DE GENEVE · GeneveCoordinatorSwitzerland
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union