Behavioral Feeding Therapy

Picky eating, food refusal, or meltdowns during breakfast, lunch, and dinner? We can help your little one achieve mealtime success one bite at a time. 

Feeding problems such as picky eating, food pocketing, refusal of major food groups or age-appropriate foods, undernourishment, and rejection of certain textures can be a major source of frustration for parents. Mealtime problem behaviors that co-occur with feeding issues such as crying, tantrums, throwing, gagging, spitting, vomiting, or packing food in mouth can also add to the frustration.

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Although it is not always clear how and why eating problems occur, there are a number of proven behavioral methods for improving or resolving them.  At Pivotal Achievements, we treat feeding issues from an Applied Behavior Analysis framework. Some of the techniques we utilize are:

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• Reinforcement

• Texture fading

• Chaining

• Bite Shaping 

• Behavioral momentum

By following a behavioral model, we can address a range of motivational and skill deficits often found in children with feeding problems. This model also provides a structured methodology for identifying and measuring changes in feeding skills and evaluating the effectiveness of treatment through data collection and analysis.