Children’s eating behavior is influenced by genetics, environmental factors, and neural mechanisms (1, 2). Particularly the family plays a crucial role in shaping eating behaviors during childhood (3). Overeating, i.e., consuming food beyond nutritional needs increases the risk of excessive weight gain in children and has become a topical concern (4). This behavior may result from low satiety responsiveness (SR), which indicates poor regulation of food intake based on feelings of fullness, high food responsiveness (FR), characterized by eating in response to food cues, or a combination of both (5, 6). Other closely related dimensions include emotional overeating (EOE) and external eating, i.e., eating in response to external cues rather than internal hunger cues. Parental questionnaires are often used to assess these eating behaviors in children.

There is limited knowledge on the frequency of overeating among children. In a Portuguese study involving 6–18-year-olds, 24% were considered overeaters (7). The evidence on factors associated with overeating and its different aspects in children is inconsistent. For example, some studies link early-life factors like breastfeeding to better eating control (high SR, low SR or low EOE) later in childhood (8–10), while others found no such associations (11–15). Being born preterm has been linked to SR but not to other aspects of overeating in preadolescence (8, 16).

Similarly, results on family factors such as parental education, body mass index (BMI), depression, and presence of siblings are contradictory, with studies showing varied outcomes depending on the child’s age and study methodology (8, 11, 16–21). Only one study showed a link between maternal depressive symptoms and child overeating (21). Parental feeding practices may either foster or undermine children’s ability to self-regulate their eating (22). These practices include emotional feeding (using food to calm or cheer up the child) and using food as a reward (23). Some (24, 25) studies demonstrate a link between parental emotional feeding and aspects of overeating, but not all (26). In a clinical study of preadolescents living with overweight, maternal emotional feeding was the key predictor of child emotional eating (27). In addition, several parenting factors, such as low maternal support, but high psychological and behavioral control (28), as well as non-authoritative and emotionally non-responsive parenting (29) have been linked to child emotional eating. Associations regarding food as a reward have also been reported, although the results have not been confirmed for all aspects of overeating in longitudinal study settings (24, 30–33).

Previous studies have identified several early-life and family characteristics that may contribute to overeating in children. However, only a few studies have assessed these factors simultaneously to investigate their hierarchy and independent associations. Most studies have focused on children under school age, leaving a gap in research on preadolescents approaching or experiencing puberty—a unique developmental stage characterized by rapid physical growth, hormonal changes, and emotional shifts that can influence eating behaviors. Our study aimed to determine the prevalence of a parent-reported tendency towards overeating (hereafter, simply ‘overeating’) in Finnish 9–12-year-old preadolescents, and to investigate the associated child and parental characteristics.

We simultaneously evaluated various early-life and family determinants of a parent-reported tendency towards overeating in a large cohort of Finnish preadolescents. This is the first study to investigate these relationships, and it fulfils the gap of knowledge concerning eating behaviors in preadolescents. There is sparse data on the frequency of overeating among children and adolescents. In our sample, overeating was reported in 10%, which is less than in a Portuguese study with 6─18-year-olds (24%) (7).

Overeating was strongly linked to preadolescent’s overweight and obesity in this study, consistent with previous reports (5, 45). Overeating and its various aspects are considered mediating factors for overweight and obesity (5). For example, low SR is likely to contribute to higher energy intake and it is also one of the mechanisms through which genetic predisposition leads to weight gain (46, 47). In fact, determinants such as parental emotional feeding and rewarding practices have also been connected with overweight (48).

In addition to weight, we identified several independent determinants of overeating. In our study, boys were more prone to overeating than girls. This may be partly explained by differences in parental feeding practices towards sons and daughters (49). Sons are encouraged to eat more and are served larger portions (50, 51), while daughters are taught food avoidant strategies, and parents are in general more concerned about their daughters’ than their sons’ weight status (52, 53).

The finding that parental depression increased the odds of overeating is both interesting and concerning. This might reflect preadolescents’ response to parent ill-health through overeating. Moreover, parents with depression may have altered feeding behaviors and give their children less autonomy in eating (54). Our findings align with results from the ALSPAC study, UK, where maternal depressive symptoms during the first 5 years of the child’s life predicted greater parental worry about child overeating at age 8, and greater self-reported emotional and external eating at age 14 among 3,887 participants (21). The question on overeating in that study was different from ours, as it specifically covered parental worry about child overeating. Moreover, mothers completed a questionnaire on postnatal depression (55), while our question addressed any history of diagnosed and/or treated depression. Contrasting our findings, a Danish study (n = 1,939) demonstrated that maternal psychiatric disorders were not associated with child-reported emotional or external eating at ages 11–12 (16). Register data on psychiatric disorders, and The Eating Pattern Inventory for children (EPI-C) (56) were used in the Danish study. No association was found between parental depression and SR or FR either, as measured with the Children’s Eating Behavior Questionnaire (CEBQ) (6) in 2–5-year-old Australian children (n = 977) (11). Given that all studies rely on different methodologies, future research should replicate these findings.

Furthermore, we observed that parental emotional feeding was linked to overeating. This finding is plausible, since receiving food for other purposes than hunger might disturb the natural satiety signals, resulting in overeating (57). However, this aspect has been sparsely studied with conflicting results. Previous studies are based on rather small samples with less than 550 children (24–26), and most included much younger children than our study. In line with our findings, an Australian study reported a link between maternal emotional feeding at age 2 and a tendency to overeat at age 3 (24). The researchers used a factor called ‘tendency to overeat’ based on items from the parent version of the Dutch Eating Behavior Questionnaire (58) and CEBQ (6). A US study using CEBQ and including children from low-income and minority households also observed a longitudinal association between emotional feeding and FR, but the results on SR were opposite at different ages (25). Higher emotional feeding at the age of 3 years predicted higher SR 1 year later, but higher emotional feeding at the age of 4 years was associated with lower SR 1 year later. On the other hand, a Chinese study involving 7–12-year-old children did not find associations between emotional feeding and any of these eating behaviors measured by the CEBQ (26).

The main strength of the Fin-HIT study is its large sample size. The sample is representative of school children in urban and semi-urban areas of Finland. Thus, the findings may be generalized to similar populations in areas with moderate population density in Western countries. We included a wide variety of variables from several data sources: parent-reported questionnaire, anthropometric measures made mainly by trained fieldworkers, and objective register data. This allowed us to cover multiple aspects of the topic and address their hierarchy in a systematic way. In addition, a sensitivity analysis was conducted, and it confirmed our findings.

The main limitation relates to the cross-sectional study design: we were unable to indicate causality between the determinants and outcomes. Moreover, we used a single question to assess overeating, instead of a validated questionnaire such as the CEBQ with mean scores for the SR, FR and EOE subscales (6). Our measure did not give a continuous ranking for the children on a scale, but divided them into groups, which might affect the results.

Many determinants were not measured objectively since reported by the parents. We do not have verified diagnoses of parental depression, nor do we know when it manifested. However, our question is considered easy to answer and suitable for epidemiological study purposes. Breastfeeding was reported retrospectively and reflects the situation on average 11 years before estimating overeating. However, it has been proved that breastfeeding can be reliably reported several years later (14). The register data on maternal SES was from the time of the child’s birth. We assume the SES to be similar or higher at the time of data collection; higher in particular among the tenth of the mothers who were previously studying.

Future research should explore the mechanisms underlying the associations between parental depression, emotional feeding, and overeating in preadolescents. Longitudinal studies would allow to establish causal relationships and examine how these factors interact over time. A crucial next step is to investigate how interventions aimed at improving parental mental health, and promoting healthy feeding practices, impact children’s eating behaviors and weight trajectories.

Our findings highlighted that along with weight status, sex, parental depression, and emotional feeding are linked to a parent-reported tendency towards overeating in preadolescence. Since overeating predisposes to obesity, and childhood obesity is a substantial public health issue, all efforts to recognize the causes of obesity and to prevent it are needed. To promote health, parents should be taught to use other ways than food to console their child. Finally, it is important to support parental mental health since this might affect the child’s eating behavior.