Despite anecdotal reports of children being more sensitive to texture than adults, and of texture being one of the main drivers of food aversions, there is a paucity of scientific knowledge on the influence of texture perception on food choice in children. The primary goals of this study were to assess the use of a modified letter-identification task to study lingual tactile acuity, one aspect of oral sensitivity, in children and to examine age-related differences in sensitivity. The secondary goal was to explore whether lingual tactile acuity and age relate to various measures of food choice and preference. To this end, children 7-10 years old (31 girls, 21 boys) and their mothers were tested using identical procedures. To assess lingual tactile acuity, children and mothers were asked to use the tips of their tongues to identify raised alphabetical letters of varying size (2.5-8.0 mm) on Teflon strips. To relate lingual tactile acuity to food texture preferences, a forced-choice questionnaire assessed preferences for foods similar in flavor but different in texture (e.g., smooth versus crunchy peanut butter). Children were able to complete the lingual acuity task as well as their mothers and took less time to assess each letter stimulus (p < 0.001); however, there were no age-related differences in lingual acuity (p = 0.14). Age, but not lingual acuity, related to food texture preferences: mothers preferred harder foods (p < 0.001) and those containing more particles (p < 0.04) than did children, although children's preferences became more adult-like with increasing age. The availability of a rapid, child-friendly method for assessing oral sensitivity opens up new possibilities of examining differences in oral tactile perceptions across the life span. That food preferences changed with age and were not related to oral sensitivity underscores the fact that factors such as experience, culture and family food practices have a significant impact on children's food texture preferences.

中文翻译：

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儿童及其母亲的语言触觉敏锐度和食物质地偏好


尽管有传闻称儿童对质地比成人更敏感，并且质地是食物厌恶的主要驱动因素之一，但关于质地感知对儿童食物选择的影响的科学知识却很少。本研究的主要目标是评估使用修改后的字母识别任务来研究儿童的语言触觉敏锐度（口腔敏感性的一个方面），并检查与年龄相关的敏感性差异。第二个目标是探索语言触觉敏锐度和年龄是否与食物选择和偏好的各种衡量标准相关。为此，7-10 岁的儿童（31 名女孩，21 名男孩）及其母亲使用相同的程序进行了测试。为了评估舌触觉敏锐度，儿童和母亲被要求用舌尖识别聚四氟乙烯条上不同大小（2.5-8.0 毫米）的凸起字母。为了将语言触觉敏锐度与食物质地偏好联系起来，强制选择问卷评估了对风味相似但质地不同的食物的偏好（例如，光滑与松脆的花生酱）。孩子们能够像他们的母亲一样完成语言敏锐度任务，并且花更少的时间来评估每个字母刺激（p < 0.001）；然而，舌敏度不存在与年龄相关的差异（p = 0.14）。年龄（而非语言敏锐度）与食物质地偏好相关：与儿童相比，母亲更喜欢较硬的食物（p < 0.001）和含有更多颗粒的食物（p < 0.04），尽管随着年龄的增长，儿童的偏好变得更像成人。一种快速、适合儿童的口腔敏感性评估方法的出现，为检查整个生命周期口腔触觉感知的差异开辟了新的可能性。 食物偏好随年龄而变化，且与口腔敏感性无关，这凸显了这样一个事实：经验、文化和家庭饮食习惯等因素对儿童的食物质地偏好有重大影响。