Emotional or restraint? The influence of eating behaviour trait on attention for food

Abstract

Background: Emotional and restraint eating are two different eating traits that affect food intake. Emotional eating (EE) is described as the tendency to overeat unhealthy food in response to negative emotions, whereas restraint eating is a trait characterized by chronic diet and high motivation to restrict the food consumption. The aim of the study was to see if the eating behaviour trait influences the attention for high-calorie (comfort) food, and if this effect varies across gender. Methods: 100 participants (50 females) were asked to perform a visual task with pictures of healthy or unhealthy food and neutral objects. After viewing them for 1 second, they had 25 seconds to recall them. The Dutch Eating Behaviour Questionnaire was administered to assess emotional, restraint and external eating traits. Findings: A significant two-way interaction Gender*Emotional Eating (p = .02) was found in the visual task: females with low EE recalled more unhealthy objects, whereas females with high EE recalled more healthy objects. Moreover, females, compared to males, showed higher restraint eating trait (p = .01). Discussion: Emotional and restraint eating can be both present, with restraint eating counteracting the effect of emotional eating. Even if individuals are prone to overeat in response to negative emotions, being on diet and avoiding weight gain can act as stop/avoidance signal when facing indulgent food stimuli. Replication studies have been planned in order to better understand this effect, using more precise techniques, such as eye-tracking which allows to measure more objectively the presence of attentional bias.