Negative emotional eating patterns among American university students: A replication study

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Behavioral Science
• Clinical Psychology

Background:

• Emotional eating (EE) is linked to obesity, weight gain, and eating disorders.
• Cultural factors influence eating behaviors, but globalized eating practices may create similarities in EE patterns.
• This study replicates a previous investigation on Chinese college students by examining EE in American college students.

Purpose of the Study:

• To identify distinct emotional eating patterns among American college students.
• To compare these patterns with those found in Chinese college students.
• To assess the association between identified EE patterns and psychological factors.

Main Methods:

• 533 American college students completed the Adult Eating Behavior Questionnaire (emotional overeating and undereating subscales).
• Latent Class Analysis was used to identify EE patterns.
• Participants also completed measures of disordered eating, psychosocial impairment, depression, stress, anxiety, and psychological flexibility.

Main Results:

• Four distinct EE classes were identified: emotional over- and undereating (18.3%), emotional overeating (18.2%), emotional undereating (27.8%), and non-emotional eating (35.7%).
• The emotional over- and undereating class showed the highest risks for depression, anxiety, stress, and psychosocial impairment.
• This group also demonstrated lower psychological flexibility.

Conclusions:

• The findings replicate and extend previous research on EE in different cultural contexts.
• Difficulty with emotional awareness and acceptance is associated with the most problematic EE.
• Interventions such as Dialectical Behavior Therapy and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy may benefit individuals with problematic EE.