The Janus-faced effects of COVID-19 perceptions on family healthy eating behaviour: Parent’s negative experience as a mediator and gender as a moderator

This research examines the effects of COVID-19 perceptions and negative experiences during the pandemic time on parental healthy eating behaviour and whether these relationships interact with a parent’s gender. We ran a survey of parents who had at least one child aged 3 to 17 years old living in the United Kingdom. We received 384 valid responses, which were analysed via a variance-based structural equation modelling approach to test our hypotheses. The results revealed that COVID-19 perceptions effects were Janus-faced. While they indirectly and negatively impact healthy eating behaviour mediated by triggering negative experiences during the pandemic, COVID-19 perceptions, however, directly get parents, especially fathers, more engaged into healthy eating behaviour— making COVID-19 perceptions total effects positive on healthy eating behaviour. This explorative model is novel in the sense that it is the first of its kind to cast light on how parental healthy eating behaviour can be shaped in pandemic time. The research is particularly timely due to the uncertain times in which the research is situated, i.e., the worldwide pandemic (also termed COVID-19); the paper brings to light on how family eating practices can undergo dramatic shifts during acute crises