Asking Why, Instead of What: Investigating a Picky Eating Spectrum

Abstract

There is currently no universal definition for picky eating. Picky eating is also currently viewed as a binary decision. The purpose of the current study was to develop a spectrum of picky eating. The researchers used a why instead of what approach to identifying 23 picky eating categories and themes among individuals. Exploratory Factor Analysis was utilized on pilot data (N = 412) and items loaded on three factors. The first factor consisted of 7 items (α = .76) and accounted for 24.56% of the variance in the data. Factor two consisted of 10 items (α = .79) accounting for 9.87% of variance and factor three consisted of 5 items (α = .66) and accounted for 6.85% of the variance. Our results indicate that the picky eating spectrum identifies various behaviors of picky eating that could lead to targeted interventions and potentially reduce parental frustration and picky eating.