The popular parenting method of baby-led weaning, where babies are given whole, non pureed food as an introduction to solid foods, provides adequate nutrition, according to the results of a new study. The work was presented today at the NUTRITION 2024 conference in Chicago, the annual meeting of the American Society for Nutrition.

“One major concern with baby-led weaning was that it wasn’t known whether it provided enough nutrients to support infant growth,” said Kinzie Matzeller, a clinical research coordinator and registered dietitian at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, speaking in a press release.

Baby-led weaning has become increasingly popular with parents since the first research and recommendations were published on it in the early 2000s. The approach recommends allowing infants from around the age of 6 months to feed themselves solid foods with their hands. A more traditional approach is feeding pureed solids, but this is increasingly going out of fashion and proponents of baby-led weaning suggest that allowing babies to self-feed encourages healthy eating habits

Despite it’s popularity, with some online baby-led weaning “influencers” having hundreds of thousands of followers, the method has not been extensively studied.

The researchers studied baby-led weaning in 70 infants enrolled in a large National Institutes of Health (NIH) funded study called the Maternal and Infant Nutrition Trial (MINT). The study is looking at how different types of foods which are high in protein impact healthy growth and gut health and involves caregivers recording all foods that babies were fed for three days, including milk (breast or formula) and solid foods. Babies who received less than 10% of their calories from pureed foods were considered to be doing baby-led weaning. The data recorded was used to calculate the baby’s intake of nutrients and calories and the babies’ weight, length and head circumference was also measured each month.

The study found that babies fed with baby-led weaning had the same calorie intake as babies weaned with conventional methods and there was some evidence that they may have a higher growth trajectory, although the researchers stress more studies are needed to explore this finding further.

“It is reassuring to know that baby-led weaning provides adequate calories for growth,” said Matzeller. “Previous studies have relied on self-reporting for classifying baby-led weaning. The fact that we used data from diet records sets our study apart from previous research and may help provide a more universal definition for baby-led weaning, which would help standardize research on the topic,” Matzeller added.

The study also found that mothers with higher incomes and higher education levels were more likely to try baby-led weaning, with the researchers speculating that this might be that families with higher incomes may be able to more easily afford time and resources needed for food preparation and exploring alternative weaning methods.

Matzeller recommends that parents interested in baby-led weaning should try diverse foods like steamed vegetables, small pieces of meats and cheese and soft fruits. All foods offered should be offered as sticks around the size of the baby’s fist to prevent choking.

“Baby-led weaning can be a great way to incorporate more options and different types of foods your little one may not get otherwise. It often takes up to 15 exposures to a food before a baby accepts it, so persistence is key,” said Matzeller.

The researchers are planning to continue looking at baby-led weaning in a larger group of infants and also intend to look more closely at differences between different weaning methods, including impact on dietary habits as babies age and differences in vitamin and mineral intake.