Mealtime Effects on Parental Outcomes- Adolescents on the Autism Spectrum Amongst the Pandemic

Abstract

Previous studies show that various challenging behaviors in autistic children are linked to negative mental health, relationship satisfaction, and perceived family functioning outcomes in their parents, namely mothers. Mealtimes are a notoriously challenging time for families with an autistic child due to behaviors that autistic children may display in these contexts. The current study examined the potential links between mealtime behaviors in autistic children and negative mental health outcomes in parents and whether the number of these challenging mealtime behaviors changed due to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Results displayed a link between a high number of challenging mealtime behaviors in autistic children and a high reported amount of marital conflict in parents. When accounting for a moderator of parent gender, measures of parental acceptance and perceived family functioning significantly differed based on the number of reported challenging child mealtime behaviors. Finally, we found no significant differences in retrospectively reported measures of child mealtime behaviors from the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and the last six months. These results suggest that higher numbers of child mealtime behaviors in autistic children may be linked to higher levels of marital conflict in their parents, and among children with a high number of challenging mealtime behaviors, fathers may show more acceptance and perceive higher levels of family functioning than mothers. Additionally, the results suggest that the disruption in routines caused by the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic did not lead to a significant increase in the number of mealtime behaviors in autistic children. Future directions for this study include recruiting a sample size with more fathers, using observational measures to measure challenging child mealtime behaviors, and developing interventions to decrease marital conflict for parents of autistic children at mealtimes and to increase mothers? acceptance shown toward their autistic children.