Children Start Loving Vegetables While Still in the Womb

<strong>Children Start Loving Vegetables While Still in the Womb

And hating them, too!

Most parents know the struggle of trying to feed their child something green: broccoli disguised as “tiny trees”; spinach drowned in cheese sauce; zucchini so thoroughly hidden in fritters that not even a private detective could find it.

It turns out that a love — or hatred — of vegetables takes shape long before a child is born.

Researchers at Durham University in the UK spent three years following children whose mothers ate cabbage and carrots during pregnancy. To be precise, one group of women was given capsules containing carrot powder, while the other received capsules with kale powder.

The ultrasound images were remarkably clear: when a mother took a carrot capsule, the fetus made what scientists call a “laughter face” — essentially, a smile. Kale, on the other hand, produced a “cry face”.

Three weeks after birth, the babies were given cotton swabs soaked in carrot or kale solution to smell. Babies from the “carrot group” reacted calmly to carrots but grimaced at kale. Babies from the “kale group” — the opposite.

When the children turned three, the researchers repeated the experiment and got the very same results. Children whose mothers ate carrots in late pregnancy still respond more favourably to carrots than to kale. And vice versa.

“We can see that children remain more favourable towards the vegetable they were introduced to in the womb.”
— Professor Nadja Reissland

What You Can Do

If you are currently pregnant or planning to be, Professor Reissland recommends not avoiding difficult flavours in late pregnancy: bitter vegetables (broccoli, spinach, kale), sour, spicy — all of it helps shape the baby’s future flavour map.

If your child is already born and spits out anything green — it’s not too late. Research shows that children need an average of up to 15 exposures to a new flavour before it becomes familiar. Most parents give up after the third or fourth attempt. Don’t force it — just place the vegetables on the plate next to something your child likes. Sooner or later, they’ll try it on their own.

What definitely doesn’t work. Manipulation (“eat your carrots and you’ll get a sweet”) reinforces the idea that vegetables are a punishment and sweets are a reward. Camouflage (zucchini in fritters, spinach in smoothies) solves today’s problem but won’t teach a child to eat vegetables — they don’t even know they had any.

What works best. Eating together. Children mirror their parents’ eating habits. If you enjoy your salad, the chances that your child will grow to love spinach and start asking for broccoli at lunch go up significantly.