The Relationship between Maternal Eating Behaviors and Mindful Feeding and Child Eating Behavior: Mediating Role of Child’s Temperament

Eating in childhood is important for optimal growth and is affected by several components. The behavioral characteristics of the mother and the personality traits of the child are among the influential components. The main purpose of this study was to develop the modelling child eating behavior based on maternal eating behaviors, mindful feeding with mediating role of child’s temperament. The participants of this study were 180 mothers with their children (87 female and 93 male) in Urmia and Tabriz in 2020. Mothers completed the Children's Eating Behavior Inventory, Adult Eating Behavior Questionnaire, Mindful Feeding Questionnaire and Malhotra Temperament Schedule.  The results of Pearson coefficient and path analysis with SPSS and Amos revealed that there is significant relationship between maternal eating behaviors, mindful feeding, and child’s temperament with child eating behavior, the model of maternal eating behaviors, and mindful feeding with mediating role of child’s temperament and child eating behavior is significant. The Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA = 0.07) was optimal. This model determines that mother and child components affected child eating behavior and these elements should be taken into consideration in dealing with the causes and treating child eating problems.