Many babies of a few months and about 1 week old love to eat their hands, and we often abhor this habit and can’t wait to correct it for our children. But no matter what you say, or smear bitter agents such as yellow water on your fingers, or even scold your child, intervention measures may not be effective. At present, it is considered normal physiological phenomenon for infants to eat their hands before the age of 1, but many children have the habit of eating their hands after the age of 1, so you should look for the cause. “Iron deficiency and zinc deficiency may be common problems, but more alert to potential psychological problems, especially for children over 2 years old, it is likely that they will develop a fetish for hand-eating because of mental stress.” The normal phenomenon and causes of hand-eating in babies: babies explore the world by eating their hands The fact that babies of three or four months start to eat their fingers indicates that they have reached a new stage of intellectual development. From newborns who can only wave their little hands blindly, to newborns who can control their own hand activities, little babies overcome many difficulties and make many attempts. For them, being able to put their fingers in their mouths accurately is a huge step forward. In addition, finger eating also acts as a benign stimulus to infants’ psychological development, stabilizing their own emotions and maintaining their curiosity to learn, since infants explore the world through their mouths. If parents start blocking their children from eating their hands within three months, the child’s psychological development will be very much affected and they will easily become less confident, suspicious and timid when they grow up. The abnormal phenomenon of baby hand-eating and the reasons for it: children over 1 year old eat their hands to find the reason Children to 1 year old, with the expansion of the range of activities, the richness of life, no longer need to eat fingers as a single way to achieve the purpose of exploring the world. At this point, if the child still likes to eat his hands, parents should look for the reason. It is important to note that hand-eating is often a way for children to relieve stress and combat loneliness, and parents often tend to ignore this and focus only on micronutrient deficiencies. Children eat hands can reflect several psychological: when parents or caregivers rarely and children skin to skin, rarely talk with children, do games, children hungry, sick can not get timely comfort, eating hands is a baby masturbation method; if the child’s living environment, caregivers often change, or parents often reprimanded scolded baby, family relations, etc., under greater psychological pressure, the child will eat hands to To relieve the inner pressure; If the child is often alone at home playing with toys, watching TV, not in contact with partners of the same age and new things, will inevitably feel lonely, lonely and boring, the child will use hand-eating to relieve loneliness and isolation. When the child is nervous and anxious, hungry, bored or imitating other children who occasionally eat their hands, mothers and fathers see it and reprimand them severely, making the child even more nervous, but will further strengthen the child to eat hands. Parents should not use brutal and simple means to correct their baby’s hand-eating To help your child break the habit of hand-eating, you should first take your child for a micronutrient test, and if it is lacking, you should supplement it in time. If the body is healthy, we should consider the stress caused by psychological problems, can be corrected from the following aspects: more hugs, more company children, carefully distinguish the child’s various requirements, to meet his various needs, the conditions of the mother can do touch massage for the child, before bedtime to tell the baby a relaxing story, light children’s songs, so that the child sleep happily, feel safe, happy and satisfied at all times. When your child eats his hands, you can give him a teething cookie for his little mouth to gnaw on, or a comfort pacifier or teething stick to replace his little hands (comfort pacifiers and teething sticks should be cleaned and disinfected). You can let your baby play more with small partners, more exposure to the fresh world outside; arrange colorful activities for your baby, try not to let him alone, he will not want to get up to eat his hands. If the baby is full 2 years old and still eats hands, parents should take the baby together with the doctor, and together with the doctor to analyze the reasons for the baby sucking fingers, according to the different reasons for correction, light can guide the mother and father to meet the baby’s emotional needs and other measures, the heavy use of behavior correction methods.