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Food memories are salient across the lifespan and recent work suggests that memories for past food experiences, especially those from childhood, may influence caregivers’ present-day eating and family meal planning behaviors. Yet, researchers have not identified how cultural ideology interacts with the memory system to inform the intergenerational transmission of food values and beliefs within the family unit. This omission has the potential to perpetuate pre-existing health disparities in families belonging to minority groups and limits the efficacy and appeal of nutritional initiatives within an ever-diversifying U.S. population. Across three studies, the present dissertation examined qualitative and quantitative data on childhood memories, eating motivations, and physical health collected from caregivers belong to four subcultural groups in the U.S. The primary aims of this dissertation were to provide a systematic comparison of food and non-food memories using mixed methods (Study 1), examine food memories from a cultural perspective (Study 2), and identify potential pathways between food memories, eating motivations, and health (Study 3). The three studies presented in this dissertation demonstrated that childhood autobiographical food memories are unique, culturally bound, and potentially linked to food-related behaviors, eating motivations, and health status later in life. This dissertation provides the first known evidence of a culturally moderated pathway between the autobiographical memory system, eating motivations, health perceptions, and caregiver BMI and represents a first step towards identifying how the memory system can be used to develop more inclusive and efficacious healthcare programs.

Parents frequently talk to their children about past experiences. When parents perceive it is important for their child to provide a highly factual recount of a past event, they may use evaluations to encourage accuracy. Specifically, negative evaluations serve to negate the child’s input (“No, that didn’t happen”) while positive evaluations are used to specifically affirm their input (“Yes, that’s right”) or more generally encourage conversation (“Uh-huh” or “Oh, I see”). However, some literature suggests that these more general encouraging evaluations may serve a different function relative to appraising, or positive and negative, evaluations. As such, the present research explored this relation in conjunction with conversation accuracy demand and child gender. Eighty-nine children (Mage = 54.93 months) engaged in a brief, scripted play activity with a researcher. Afterwards, caregivers were instructed to discuss the event with their child, either in a factual way or an entertaining way. These conversations were coded on a variety of narrative characteristics, including how frequently caregivers used evaluations. Analyses revealed that parents used appraising and encouraging evaluations differently. In addition, an interaction between child gender and context condition was found for appraising evaluations. Theoretical implications, as well as potential application and future directions, are discussed.