The Effect of a Telehealth Intervention on Mother–Child’s Feeding Interactions During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Purpose: This study evaluated the outcomes of a telehealth intervention aimed at enhancing exchanges in mother–child dyads who showed an impoverishment of the quality of their feeding interactions and a worsening of their psychopathological symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods: N=334 mothers and their three-year-old children were recruited to assess their feeding interactions through an observational tool administered via a web platform, and maternal and offspring psychopathological symptoms were measured through the SCL/90-R and the CBCL 1.5–5. This study constitutes the third wave (T3) of a longitudinal research. Results: Our results showed that the intervention significantly improved the quality of mother–child feeding interactions. Moreover, mothers’ psychopathological symptoms reduced after the intervention, especially in the interpersonal sensitivity, hostility, depression, anxiety, and obsessive-compulsive-compulsive subscales; offspring emotional/behavioral functioning and dysregulation symptoms also decreased, particularly in the subscales of withdrawn anxious/depressed attention problems and aggressive behavior. Conclusion: This study adds knowledge to the literature on COVID-19 pandemic effects on psychological health of parents and young children, proposing a method of intervention that had been effectively adopted previously but whose effectiveness had not been investigated during the pandemic.