Study findings

"Food fussiness" (FF) is fairly common "and typically develops early in life (during toddlerhood) with prevalence rates ranging between 6% and 50%," the researchers said.

According to the researchers, previous studies of fussy and picky eating suggest that "the behaviours tend to peak in early-to-middle childhood, with most, though not all, children showing decreases in FF as they mature into adolescence."

For the study, researchers recruited 2,400 sets of both identical and non-identical twin children and their parents from Gemini, "a population-based cohort of twin children born in England and Wales in 2007." The researchers asked parents to periodically fill out questionnaires about their children's eating habits from ages 16 months to 13 years old.

The researchers found that non-identical twin pairs were much less similar when it came to picky eating than identical twin pairs, suggesting genetics had a significant influence on shaping children's willingness to try new foods. 

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Because picky eating habits could prevent developing children from getting adequate nutrition, intervention could be effective from childhood through adolescence.

"These findings suggest that toddlers who present with higher food fussiness are also more likely to experience greater increases in food fussiness as they mature," the researchers wrote. "This is of interest not only to researchers but also to clinicians and the wider child and adolescent health community."

According to Zeynep Nas, one of the study's lead authors and a researcher at University College London (UCL), "food fussiness is common among children and can be a major source of anxiety for parents and caregivers, who often blame themselves for this behavior or are blamed by others."

"We hope our finding that fussy eating is largely innate may help to alleviate parental blame," Nas said. "This behavior is not a result of parenting. Our study also shows that fussy eating is not necessarily just a 'phase', but may follow a persistent trajectory."

Clare Llewellyn, a senior author on the study and a professor at UCL, noted that "[w]hile genetic factors are the predominant influence for food fussiness, environment also plays a supporting role. Shared environmental factors, such as sitting down together as a family to eat meals, may only be significant in toddlerhood."

"This suggests that interventions to help children eat a wider range of foods, such as repeatedly exposing children to the same foods regularly and offering a variety of fruits and vegetables, may be most effective in the very early years," Llewellyn added.

Abigail Pickard, a researcher in developmental child psychology at Aston University who was not involved in the study, said that picky eating is "quite common" in children, adding that one of her recent studies found that roughly 16% of British children between the ages of 3 and 5 showed picky eating behavior. Pickard found that factors such as age, parental feeding practices, and culture played a part in whether a child was picky.

"Parents should try to maintain a relaxed atmosphere around mealtimes and avoid turning food into a power struggle," Pickard said, adding that caregivers should try to model healthy eating habits and avoid offering children food as a reward for eating food they don't like.