Taste preferences for both soft drinks and water were
significantly associated with soft drink consumption in
our study. Other studies with children, adolescents, and
adults have similarly shown that taste is one of the most
important influences on food choices (16-19). A longitudinal
study on children’s taste preferences found that the
strongest predictor of the number of foods that a child
liked at age 8 was the number of foods liked at age 4 (20).
This reinforces that taste preferences begin early in life,
and thus it may be most effective to intervene at an early
age