Child food neophobia and sympathetic arousal in response to odor exposure

Child food neophobia (CFN) refers to the rejection or avoidance of novel foods in childhood. In our recent psychophysical study, we observed that higher CFN was linked to poorer olfactory abilities. Paradoxically, children with CFN are often described as being highly sensitive to sensory qualities, including the olfactory aspects of food. Here, we examined an arousal-based mechanism that might explain this inconsistency. Hypothetically, odors – particularly those that are unfamiliar or food-related – may generate heightened (unpleasant) sympathetic arousal in (sensitive) children with CFN. This heightened arousal could reduce their olfactory exploratory behaviors and hinder olfactory development, resulting in poorer performance on smell tests.
We investigated this hypothesis by measuring sympathetic arousal in response to six food and non-food odors varying in familiarity in 95 children (46 girls) aged 4–9 years. Data were collected using a BioPac MP36 physiological amplifier and analyzed via AcqKnowledge software (BioPac Systems, USA). We assessed the response amplitude of electrodermal activity as an index of sympathetic arousal following odor exposure relative to characteristics of children (CFN, anxiety, odor identification scores, age, gender), caregivers (food neophobia, age), and odors (pleasantness and familiarity ratings, edibility and presentation order).