[Investigation of the compulsive and impulsive behavioral addictions among adolescents]

Recently there has been an increase in the number of studies focusing on behavioral addictions. The aim of our research was to examine the behavioral addictions among adolescents and prove their connection with emotion regulation difficulties. Based on the compulsive-impulsive spectrum approach of addictions we hypothesized that the compulsive and impulsive forms of eating disorders (binge eating, emotional eating and restriction) - despite their various symptom structure - share a common motive, i.e. the emotion regulation deficit.

Our participants were high-school students (n = 272) between the age of 16 and 17 (128 males and 144 females, mean age: 16,8). We used the impulse- and emotion control subscales on the emotional stability dimension of the Big Five Questionnaire (BFQ), the Three Factor Eating Questionnaire (TFEQ-R21), the Hungarian Problematic Internet Use Questionnaire (PIH-K) and the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS).

We found a strong connection between the uncontrolled eating and the problematic internet use (r = 0,404; p < 0,05). As expected, the individuals' skill of emotion regulation and their impulsiveness are both strongly correlated to these impulsive disorders (see Table 1.) Interestingly the cognitive restriction (r=0,073; p>0,05) and emotional eating (r=0,061; p>0,05) did not correlate with emotion regulation difficulties. There was a connection between the emotional eating and the emotion- (r=-0,264; p<0,05) and impulse control deficit (r=-0,142; p<0,05), however.

On the basis of these results we argue that the impulsive behavior of the adolescents (binge eating, problematic internet use) is determined by their impulsivity and their emotion regulation strategy. However, a compulsive behavior such as the cognitive restraint is regarded as a much more conscious and healthy behavior, the core feature of the emotional eating is also assumes a high anxiety level.