Food availability, motivational-related factors, and food consumption: a path model study with children

The promotion of children’s healthy eating is a key public health priority. However, children’s food consumption is a complex phenomenon with several contributing factors, and there is a call to continue developing comprehensive models with several variables acting simultaneously. The present study aimed to examine the role different motivational-related variables (e.g., self-regulation, self-efficacy) may play in children’s consumption of healthy and unhealthy foods. To address this goal, data were collected in a sample of 242 fifth and sixth graders with access to both healthy and unhealthy foods at home. A path model was conducted to analyze networks of relationships between motivational-related variables and children’s healthy and unhealthy eating. The gender variable was included as a covariate to control its effect. The data showed that self-regulation for healthy eating mediates the relationship between the predictor variables (i.e., knowledge, attitude, and self-efficacy) and the type of food consumption (healthy and unhealthy). Current data contribute to understanding the complexity behind food consumption by providing a comprehensive model with motivational-related factors associated with both healthy and unhealthy eating. The present findings are likely to help inform the development of early preventive interventions focused on the promotion of healthy eating.
This study was conducted at the Psychology Research Centre (CIPsi/UM) School of
Psychology, University of Minho, supported by the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT)
through the Portuguese State Budget (UIDB/01662/2020). Additionally, this study was supported
by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology and the Portuguese Ministry of Science,
Technology and Higher Education through national funds (PTDC/PSI-GER/28302/2017) and cofinanced by FEDER through COMPETE2020 under the PT2020 Partnership Agreement (POCI-01-
0145-FEDER-028302). This study was also supported by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and
Technology and the Portuguese Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education, through
the national funds, within the scope of the Transitory Disposition of the Decree No. 57/2016, of
29th of August, amended by Law No. 57/2017 of 19 July. BP (SFRH/BD/143469/2019) and DR
(DFA/BD/10221/2020) were supported by a Doctoral research grant from the Portuguese Foundation
for Science and Technology