Past and present studies of children’s diets will be used to explore how eating habits in early life may affect long-term wellbeing. Experts aim to uncover how young children’s diets influence health and growth in adolescence and early adulthood.Researchers at the Division of Global Agriculture and Food Systems, in collaboration with colleagues at the Universities of Aberdeen and Bristol, will examine data from a range of surveys and long-running studies to better understand how the diets of children in the UK are likely to impact their health in years to come.The team will use information from two long-running studies which have information on diet in childhood as well as later measurements of health and growth, the Children of the 90s, or Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) and the Study of Eczema and Asthma To Observe the effects of Nutrition (SEATON) from North-East Scotland. To allow the findings to be applied to today’s young children, the diet of children in the ALSPAC and SEATON studies will be compared with results from two present-day studies, the UK-wide National Diet and Nutrition Survey (NDNS) and the survey of Diet in Scotland’s Children (DISH). Experts will seek to understand the influence of early diets. Early childhood is a critical time period for growth and development. Cohort studies that have collected data for the past 30 years will give us the opportunity to explore how diet through early childhood influences health outcomes into early adult life. Dr Alexa Bellows Division of Global Agriculture and Food Systems, University of Edinburgh Impact on growth Using these four studies, the team will investigate how products such as commercial baby foods, plant-based drinks, animal proteins and sugars in fruit juice consumed in early childhood, from one to five years old, influence children’s growth, dental, lung, and heart health into adulthood. Further questions will be guided by discussions with parents, childcare providers and health professionals.Outcomes from the two-and-a-half-year study, which is funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research, will be shared with policy advisors and practitioners to inform future guidance on feeding young children well. In this project we will be listening to the views of parents and others who are responsible for feeding young children, to ensure the findings are relevant to their experiences and concerns. Dr Leone Craig University of Aberdeen By bringing together past and present-day studies we will see how diets of children have changed so that we can assess how links between early diet and later health could apply to the young children of today and tomorrow. Professor Kate Northstone University of Bristol Related links NIHR Publication date 03 Jun, 2025
