COMPLEMENTARY FEEDING AT REQUEST

Key words: Weaning, Complementary feeding

Up to date literature on complementary feeding recommends to respect the child innate self-regulation abilities and gives the adults the not easy task to make appropriate food available without following strict time schemes. An emerging approach to complementary feeding implies the possibility of totally devolving the initiative to the child both at the beginning and in the management of the complementary nutrition, as an instrument of early empowerment and of his abilities to correctly modulate food intake. This approach may result in positive effects on the prevention of alimentary disorders, including obesity, and on the relational disorders between the child and other family.