Dozens of studies over the last few decades have documented the negative effects of malnourishment on children's intellectual development. A grayer area is whether "marginal" malnutrition or skipping meals affect behavior or school performance.
Lack of many different nutrients can contribute to behavior problems in children. Sometimes it is not only the missed meal, but also the child's reaction to a stressful situation that contributes.
Without any magical answers, caregivers often have to deal with rambunctious and sometimes unruly children. The children may easily lose control, if their needs are not being met. There are many causes of such behavior, including a desire for attention , over stimulation, lack of sleep, too much television, and lack of exercise.
MISSED BREAKFAST
Common sense dictates that it is unreasonable to expect anyone to learn and perform work when fuel, in the form of breakfast, has not been provided. By the late morning, discomfort from hunger may become distracting, even if a child has eaten breakfast. The problem appears to be at least partly due to low blood sugar. The average child up to age ten or so needs to eat every four to six hours to maintain a blood sugar concentration high enough to support the
activity of the brain and nervous system.
IRON DEFICIENCY
Iron deficiency presents the best-known and most widespread effect on behavior. A lack of iron
not only causes an energy crisis, but also directly affects behavior, mood, attention span, and learning ability. Iron deficiency usually is not diagnosed in the blood until it has progressed all the way to overt anemia. A child's brain, however, is sensitive to low levels of iron long before blood effects appear.
OTHER NUTRIENT DEFICIENCIES Iron is only one of several nutrients that can be displaced with empty-calorie foods. Other nutrients may be lacking as well, and the deficiencies of those nutrients may also cause behavioral as well as physical symptoms. Diets lacking in Vitamin C, protein, Riboflavin and magnesium may also impact on behavior, according to Debruyne, Rolfes and Whitney in Life Cycle Nutrition: Conception Through Adolescence.
Protein-energy deficiency can lead to apathy, fretfulness, lack of energy or a lack of interest in food.
Riboflavin deficiency, may produce symptoms of depression, hysteria, psychopathic behavior, lethargy and hypochondria before this deficiency can be can be detected by clinical symptoms.
Vitamin C deficiency may cause such symptoms as hysteria, depression, listlessness, lassitude, weakness, aversion to work, hypochondria, social introversion, fatigue, and possibly iron anemia.
Magnesium deficiency may have symptoms such as apathy, personality changes, hyperirritability.
Zinc deficiency may cause poor appetite, failure to grow, iron-deficiency anemia, irritability, emotional disorders, and mental lethargy.
Should suspicion of dietary inadequacies be raised, no matter what other causes may be implicated, those responsible for the feeding of the child should take prompt steps to correct those inadequacies.
The information in this article was taken from the study guide which accompanies correspondence study course FN 160 Nutrition and the Preschool Child written by Patricia A. Kendall, Ph.D., R.D. and offered by Colorado State University Continuing Education. For more information on this or other child care related courses, call (800)525-4950 or send email to:
inquiries@vines.colostate.edu. You may also want to brows our World Wide Web site at:
http://www.ColoState.EDU/Depts/CE