The influence of negative urgency, attentional bias, and emotional dimensions on palatable food consumption

Unveiling the lockdown effects: exploring behavior, dietary habits and weight changes in rural Egypt during COVID-19 lockdown: a cross-sectional retrospective study

BACKGROUND

The COVID-19 lockdown significantly impacted dietary habits and body weights globally, particularly in Egypt, where 57.03% of the population resides in rural areas, despite lack of information. The study examines the impact of COVID-19 lockdown on the weight changes of the rural Egyptian population through behavioral, physical, and dietary changes.

METHODS

A cross-sectional online survey using Microsoft Forms was distributed in Delta regions in Egypt. The questionnaire used a modified version of the validated 14- items PREDIMED MedDiet Adherence Screener (MEDAS). The first part of the questionnaire addressed sociodemographic variables whereas the second one included questions related to dietary, behavioral and weight changes of participants. These changes were statistically tested for significance in relation to BMI, gender, home living, current job and family history of obesity.

RESULTS

A total of 306 participated in the study (70% females, 13% obese, 95% living with family, 56% university students, and 36% with family history of obesity). Obese showed a significant increase in sweet intake whereas underweight and normal weight people displayed a significant decrease in eating desire. Both females and males showed significant increase in consumption of fruits and vegetables with significant decrease in soft drink. However, women showed a significant decrease in sport activity relative to men. Participants living with family showed an increase in sweet intake while those living alone explored an increase in meal frequency. Employers revealed a significant decrease in sport activities and people with family history of obesity reported more sleeping times than those without family history of obesity.

CONCLUSION

During Covid-19 quarantine, Egyptians' eating habits improved, but daily routines were disrupted. Raising awareness about obesity and providing guidance on maintaining activity, energy, and mood is crucial for future quarantine situations.

The influence of negative urgency and mood inductions on alcohol cognitions

BACKGROUND

Negative urgency (NU), the tendency to act rashly during negative emotional states, is a robust risk factor for alcohol misuse that is posited to function in part through alcohol-related cognitions. Nonetheless, relatively little research has examined mood-based fluctuations in such cognitions, which could help to explain how the trait of NU translates to impulsive alcohol-related behaviors. We examined how NU impacted several alcohol cognitions (positive/negative alcohol expectancies, positive/negative alcohol valuations, and alcohol craving for positive/negative emotional reinforcement) before and after negative, neutral, or positive mood inductions. We hypothesized that NU would predict greater and more favorable endorsement of alcohol and its effects following negative (vs. positive or neutral) mood induction.

METHODS

Participants (N = 428) were southern-midwestern college students recruited for an online experiment. Following the provision of consent, participants rated NU and preinduction alcohol cognitions, and were then randomly assigned to one of three (negative, neutral, or positive) mood inductions; subsequently, postinduction alcohol-cognition ratings were immediately obtained. We conducted six robust multilevel linear models (one per DV) examining NU's influence on within-person changes in alcohol cognitions across each mood induction.

RESULTS

No three-way interactions were identified and only one two-way interaction involving NU was identified. There were main effects across mood induction conditions and time points for NU predicting greater endorsement of positive and negative alcohol outcome expectancies, and greater alcohol craving for positive and negative emotional reinforcement.

CONCLUSIONS

Greater NU predicts greater perceived likelihood of alcohol's effects, alongside greater desire for mood improvement from alcohol. The absence of three-way interactive effects indicates NU's influence on mood-dependent fluctuations in alcohol cognitions may manifest over longer timescales (e.g., months and years), involve alternative cognitive processes (e.g., drinking motives and implicit alcohol cognitions), and apply more broadly to desires for mood improvement than purely negative emotional reinforcement.

Inhibitory control towards angry stimuli in patients with binge eating disorder: a pilot study

BACKGROUND

Emotion regulation theories and the negative urgency concept assume that negative mood increases binge eating. Negative emotions are considered as a trigger for binge eating, while binge eating itself is regarded as an impulsive behavior and should thus be increased within the negative urgency concept. Anger might be a specific negative emotion triggering binge eating in patients with binge eating disorder (BED). We investigated how inhibitory control as one main factor of impulsivity is influenced by anger stimuli in patients with BED and two control groups.

METHODS

We compared patients with BED (N = 20) with normal-weight healthy control participants (NW-CG, N = 20) and BMI-matched overweight and obese control participants (BMI-CG, N = 18). We used the emotional Stop Signal task (eSST) to investigate inhibitory control, where we presented angry facial expressions in comparison with neutral facial expressions as emotional stimuli.

RESULTS

All participants showed decreased inhibitory control in the angry versus neutral condition, i.e., a faster Stop Signal Reaction Time and a lower percentage of correct reactions. However, no significant group differences emerged in terms of performance. Performance in the eSST did not correlate with negative urgency, disorder- or emotion-related characteristics.

CONCLUSIONS

The current pilot study does not deliver evidence for decreased inhibitory control towards angry stimuli in patients with BED, as we detected a general and not disorder-related effect in all participants that might represent the conjunction of inhibitory control and anger. A direct mood induction technique might have led to different results. Further research in healthy and clinical groups is needed.

The association between mental health and Bulimia Nervosa among a sample of Lebanese young adults: the indirect effect of difficulties in emotion regulation

BACKGROUND

Bulimia nervosa (BN) is defined as repeated episodes of binge eating, followed by compensatory behaviors such as self-induced vomiting. BN has been shown to be associated with many co-morbidities including depression and anxiety. BN has also been associated with stress, which was shown to trigger binge eating episodes in BN. Furthermore, difficulties in emotion regulation have been seen to play an important role in the psychopathology of eating disorders, including BN. Seeing that BN is the most prevalent eating disorder in Lebanon, which is linked to the stressful events the country has been through, the study aims to examine the indirect effect of emotional dysregulation on this relationship between mental health issues (stress, anxiety and depression) and bulimia nervosa among young adults. We hypothesize that difficulties in emotion regulation would have an indirect effect in the relationship between mental health and BN.

METHODS

This was a cross-sectional observational study, based on an online anonymous survey, which was carried out between September and December of 2020. Participants were all 18 years and above, recruited from all Lebanese governorates (n = 1175).

RESULTS

Difficulties in emotion regulation mediated the association between anxiety/stress/depression and bulimia. Higher mental health issues were significantly associated with more difficulties in emotion regulation; higher difficulties in emotion regulation were significantly associated with more bulimia. Finally, higher anxiety and higher stress, but not depression, were significantly and directly associated with higher bulimia.

CONCLUSION

Results of this study could be used by mental health professional to shed light on the difficulties in emotion regulation in patients with BN and try to use therapeutic strategies to help them better regulate their emotions.

Validity and Reliability of a Revised S-UPPS-P Impulsive Behavior Scale: The Interplay between Impulsivity and Working Memory

Impulsivity is a multidimensional construct. The UPPS-P model of impulsivity differentiates five distinct dimensions: negative urgency, positive urgency, lack of premeditation, lack of perseverance, and sensation seeking. The present study, reports the first translation and validation of the recently revised short form of the UPPS-P scale (S-UPPS-P) on a Persian-speaking sample, examining the relationship between impulsivity and working memory. who also completed the Positive and Negative Affect Scale (PANAS), the Buss and Perry Aggression Questionnaire, the Behavioral Inhibition and Activation Scales (BIS/BAS), and the Wechsler Digit Span Task (WDST). A series of confirmatory factor analyses, and Cronbach's alpha results supported the factor structure of the scale. The findings supported the S-UPPS-P model's hypothesized correlations with PANAS, aggressiveness, and the construct validity of the model. The results of hierarchical regression analysis showed that backward and forward digit span scores of the WDST predicted the S-UPPS-P impulsivity scores over the portion explained by BIS/BAS, PANAS, and aggression scores. To conclude, the revised S-UPPS-P Impulsive Behavior Scale was well supported even in a very different population than usually sampled, adding to growing evidence that it assesses distinct but interrelated aspects of the impulsivity construct. Our findings also suggest that attentional capacities and working memory play important roles in the prediction of impulsivity.

External food cue responsiveness and emotional eating in adolescents: A multimethod study

Eating in response to external food cues (i.e., external eating) and internal emotional experiences (i.e., emotional eating) are associated with obesity. While external and emotional eating co-occur, little is known about how external food cue responsiveness may interact with internal emotional cues to influence eating episodes in adolescents. The current study examined how trait-level external food cue responsiveness modulates momentary associations between affective states and eating in adolescents. Participants were drawn from a prior study of siblings (N = 78; ages 13-17) who completed an ecological momentary assessment protocol to assess eating episodes and affective states. External food cue responsiveness was determined by comparing energy consumption following presentation of an appetizing food (pizza) on one day and a control activity (reading) on another day. Generalized linear mixed models examined positive and negative affective states, cue responsiveness, and their interactions as predictors of the likelihood of eating. The relationship between affective states and likelihood of eating was stronger among adolescents with higher versus lower external food cue responsiveness. Among adolescents with higher cue responsiveness, endorsing negative affect was associated with a lower likelihood of eating, whereas endorsing positive affect was associated with a higher likelihood of eating (within-person effects). Findings suggest that high sensitivity to external food cues and greater proclivity for emotional eating may be likely to coincide such that any cue, internal or external, is likely to disrupt sensitivity to internal hunger and satiety signals. Future studies are needed to elucidate how sensitivities to internal and external cues may interact to influence obesity risk.

Associations between Changes in Health Behaviours and Body Weight during the COVID-19 Quarantine in Lithuania: The Lithuanian COVIDiet Study

The COVID-19 quarantine has caused significant changes in everyday life. This study aimed to evaluate the effect of the quarantine on dietary, physical activity and alcohol consumption habits of Lithuanians and the association between health behaviours and weight changes. An online cross-sectional survey was carried out among individuals older than 18 years in April 2020. The self-administered questionnaire included health behaviour and weight change data. Altogether 2447 subjects participated in the survey. Almost half of the respondents (49.4%) ate more than usual, 45.1% increased snacking, and 62.1% cooked at home more often. Intake of carbonated or sugary drinks, fast food and commercial pastries decreased, while consumption of homemade pastries and fried food increased. A decrease in physical activity was reported by 60.6% of respondents. Every third (31.5%) respondent, more often those already with overweight, gained weight. Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that the higher odds of weight gain were associated with females, older age, increased consumption of sugary drinks, homemade pastries and fried food, eating more than usual, increased snacking, decreased physical activity and increased alcohol consumption. Our data highlighted the need for dietary and physical activity guidelines to prevent weight gain during the period of self-isolation, especially targeting those with overweight and obesity.

Effects of Fruit and Vegetable Feeding Messages on Mothers and Fathers: Interactions Between Emotional State and Health Message Framing

BACKGROUND

There is a pressing need to craft optimal public health messages promoting healthy feeding behaviors among parents. How these messages influence such feeding decisions are affected by multiple interactive factors including emotional states, message framing, and gender, but these factors have not been studied in the domain of parents' feeding of their children.

PURPOSE

To evaluate the role of message framing, emotional state, and parent gender on feeding choices that parents make for their children.

METHODS

In 2016-2017, 190 parents (126 mothers) of 4- to 7-year-old children were randomly assigned to an anger or fear emotion induction and read either a gain- or loss-framed message about the importance of children's fruit and vegetable (FV) consumption prior to choosing foods for their child from a virtual reality buffet.

RESULTS

Mothers in an angry state who received a gain-framed message chose relatively more FV for their child in the virtual buffet, F(3, 180) = 4.77, p = .027. However, fathers in this group did not feed more FV, but rather reported greater intention to improve future FV feeding, F(3, 180) = 4.91, p = .028.

CONCLUSIONS

Providing gain-framed messages to parents, particularly mothers, in an anger state may be most effective for motivating healthy dietary choices for children.

CLINICAL TRIAL INFORMATION

clinicaltrials.gov NCT02622035.

The use of a positive mood induction video-clip to target eating behaviour in people with bulimia nervosa or binge eating disorder: An experimental study

Recent theoretical models and empirical research have indicated that momentary negative affect increases the likelihood of binge eating episodes for individuals with bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorder. However, relatively little research has explored the potential for positive mood to serve a protective effect in reducing the likelihood of overeating behaviour in bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorder. The current study included 30 women with bulimia nervosa or binge eating disorder in a within-subjects crossover design. Following exposure to a video designed to induce food craving, we found that a positive mood vodcast was associated with significantly lower levels of negative mood and food consumption in a taste test meal, when compared to a neutral vodcast (p = 0.002). These findings support a role for decreasing negative mood in reducing the likelihood of binge eating behaviour in women with bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorder.

Negative urgency moderates reactivity to laboratory stress inductions

Impulsive personality traits refer to a group of self-reported dispositions about self-regulatory capacity, several of which have been linked to diverse forms of psychopathology. One of these is negative urgency (NUR), the propensity to act out when experiencing negative emotions, which has been linked to substance use disorders and eating disorders. However, few laboratory studies have investigated the extent to which self-reported NUR relates to an individual's in vivo emotional and behavioral responses. Harmonizing two archival data sets on alcohol and high-energy-dense (HED) food motivation, the current study investigated NUR as a moderator of reactivity to stressful situations elicited by two commonly used stress manipulations, the Trier Social Stress Test and a stress imagery induction. A sample of 148 adults was assessed for NUR, severity of alcohol misuse or binge eating, and measures of negative affect and psychophysiological arousal (i.e., heart rate and blood pressure) prior to and following one of the two manipulations. In addition, a behavioral multiple-choice procedure assessing the relative reinforcing value of alcohol or HED foods followed the manipulations. As predicted, NUR positively moderated the effects of stress induction on self-reported negative affect and relative reinforcing value, although not arousal. Individuals exhibiting elevated NUR also exhibited greater alcohol misuse, although not greater binge eating severity. These findings provide in vivo validation of the construct of NUR and its measurement using the UPPS-P Impulsive Behavior Scale. More broadly, these findings inform the understanding of deficits that are characteristic of self-regulatory disorders. (PsycINFO Database Record

Food specific inhibitory control under negative mood in binge-eating disorder: Evidence from a multimethod approach

OBJECTIVE

Inhibitory control has been discussed as a developmental and maintenance factor in binge-eating disorder (BED). The current study is the first aimed at investigating inhibitory control in a negative mood condition on a psychophysiological and behavioral level in BED with a combination of electroencephalography (EEG) and eye tracking (ET).

METHOD

We conducted a combined EEG and ET study with overweight individuals with BED (BED+, n = 24, mean age = 31, mean BMI = 35 kg/m² ) and without BED (BED-, n = 23, mean age = 28, mean BMI = 35 kg/m² ) and a normal-weight (NWC, n = 26, mean age 28, mean BMI = 22 kg/m² ) control group. We assessed self-report data regarding impulsivity and emotion regulation as well as the processing of food stimuli under negative mood in an antisaccade task. Main outcome variables comprise event-related potentials (ERP) regarding conflict processing (N2) and performance monitoring (error-related negativity [ERN/Ne]) assessed by EEG and inhibitory control (errors in the first and second saccade) assessed by ET.

RESULTS

BED+ patients reported increased impulsivity and higher emotion regulation difficulties compared with the other groups. The eye tracking data revealed impaired inhibitory control in BED+ compared with both control groups. Further, we found preliminary evidence from EEG recordings that conflict processing might be less thorough in the BED+ sample as well as in the NWC sample. In the BED+ sample this might be connected to the inhibitory control deficits on behavioral level. While the BED- sample showed increased conflict processing latencies (N2 latencies), which might indicate a compensation mechanism, the BED+ sample did not show such a mechanism. Performance monitoring (ERN/Ne latencies and amplitudes) was not impaired in the BED+ sample compared with both control samples.

DISCUSSION

Participants with BED reported higher impulsivity and lower emotion regulation capacities. The combined investigation of electrocortical processes and behavior contributes to an advanced understanding of behavioral and electrocortical processes underlying inhibitory control in BED. Inhibitory control and negative mood, probably amplified by emotion regulation deficits, should be addressed further in the investigation and treatment of BED.

Negative urgency and expectancies increase vulnerability to binge eating in bulimia nervosa

Negative urgency (NU), the tendency to act impulsively when distressed, is associated with binge eating. Women who believe that eating alleviates negative affect are also more likely to binge eat. Thus, it is hypothesized that the individuals with high levels of NU, and who endorse these eating expectancies, will binge eat the following acute distress. This study tested these hypotheses using ecological momentary assessment. Sixteen women with the symptoms of BN completed clinical assessments, and were asked to report on distress and binges multiple times daily for two weeks. NU moderated the temporal relationship of negative affect to binges, such that women with lower scores on NU experienced a sharper increase in affect prior to binges. Individual differences in eating expectancies also moderated the relationship of affect to binge eating. Results suggest that women with high levels of NU and expectancy endorsement are triggered to binge by smaller shifts in negative affect than women who do not endorse these traits.

Strength, Affect Regulation, and Subcortical Morphology in Military Pilots

INTRODUCTION

Previous studies have shown links of body composition and fitness measures with brain structure, as well as with different aspects of emotional adjustment and well-being. However, the possible role of trait emotion-regulation success in the relationship between fitness/body composition and emotion-related subcortical structures has never been directly addressed.

METHODS

Twenty-three elite helicopter pilots were assessed in fat mass percentage, an endurance test to volitional exhaustion, bench-press power output, and negative urgency (trait affect regulation failure). Their brains were scanned using magnetic resonance imaging to estimate the size of the accumbens/amygdala, considered together, and the thalamus. Resulting correlations were used to test the relationship between body composition/fitness measures and brain structures' size, and the role of negative urgency therein, using structural equation modeling.

RESULTS

Fat mass percentage was associated with the size of the thalamus and the amygdala/accumbens. In the latter case, negative urgency and bench-press power output predicted structure size (and explained the effect of fat mass percentage away). In other words, bench-press power output and emotion regulation success (but not endurance performance) were associated with a larger amygdala/accumbens size.

CONCLUSIONS

Bench-press power output and emotion regulation success are independently associated with a larger amygdala/accumbens size, although present evidence does not allow for determination of causal directionality.

Uncontrolled eating in adolescents: The role of impulsivity and automatic approach bias for food

Obesity is a global problem reaching epidemic proportions and can be explained by unhealthy eating and sedentary lifestyles. Understanding the psychological processes underlying unhealthy eating behaviour is crucial for the development of effective obesity prevention programmes. Dual-process models implicate the interplay between impaired cognitive control and enhanced automatic responsivity to rewarding food cues as key risk factors. The current study assessed the influence of four different components of trait impulsivity (reflecting impaired cognitive control) and automatic approach bias for food (reflecting automatic responsivity to food) on uncontrolled eating in a large sample (N = 504) of young adolescents. Of the four impulsivity factors, negative urgency was found to be the strongest predictor of uncontrolled eating. Interestingly, we found that lack of premeditation was a key risk factor for uncontrolled eating, but only when approach bias for food was high, supporting a dual-process model. Lack of perseverance showed a similar interactive pattern to a lesser degree and sensation-seeking did not predict uncontrolled eating. Together, our results show that distinct components of trait impulsivity are differentially associated with uncontrolled eating behaviour in adolescents, and that automatic processing of food cues may be an important factor in modulating this relationship.

Integrating affect and impulsivity: The role of positive and negative urgency in substance use risk

BACKGROUND

The personality traits of positive and negative urgency refer to the tendencies to act rashly when experiencing unusually positive or negative emotions, respectively.

METHODS

The authors review recent empirical work testing urgency theory (Cyders and Smith, 2008a) and consider advances in theory related to these traits.

RESULTS

Empirical findings indicate that (a) the urgency traits are particularly important predictors of the onset of, and increases in, substance use in both children and young adults; (b) they appear to operate in part by biasing psychosocial learning; (c) pubertal onset is associated with increases in negative urgency, which in turn predict increases in adolescent drinking behavior; (d) variation in negative urgency trait levels are associated with variations in the functioning of an identified brain system; and (e) variations in the serotonin transporter gene, known to influence the relevant brain system, relate to variations in the urgency traits.

CONCLUSION

A recent model (Carver et al., 2008) proposes the urgency traits to be markers of a tendency to respond reflexively to emotion, whether through impulsive action or ill-advised inaction (the latter leading to depressive symptoms); this model has received empirical support. The authors discuss new directions for research on the urgency traits.