CCC- Week 9- Cognition & Appetite

Question 1

What is the Psychobiological view of appetite?

However- what can this not explain?

Answer 1

Eating is a consequence of physiological processes- monitoring nutrient status.

Such models can’t explain overeating & rise in obesity, many eating disorders etc.

Question 2

Complexity of appetite control

What are the ways in which our brain makes food related thoughts?

Answer 2

Brain looks at info visually- from the environment, our gut, endocrine system, our mouth (detecting food) & our interconnected brain areas.

These are all influenced by States & traits, genetics & epigenetics.

Food related thoughts come from these different signals.

Question 3

What are the different cognitive processes implicated with eating?

Answer 3

Memory- For food recently eaten/ liking food.

Perception- Taste/ smell, food liking, portion size.

Learning- Learned liking of food, expectations of how filling food will be.

Decision making- About when to eat, what to eat, healthy choices.

Attention- Responsiveness to food cues, awareness of physiological appetite signals, distraction while eating.

Question 4

What are the different cognitive theories for susceptibility to overeat?

Answer 4

Externality Theory

Restraint Theory

Emotional Eating

Question 5

What is Externality Theory?

Answer 5

Susceptibility to weight gain-is dependent on the extent to which internal & external signals motivate a person to eat (Schachter 1968)

Predicted that obese people would be more responsive to external signals then physiological (internal) appetite signals.

Question 6

What is Restraint Theory?

Answer 6

Individuals use cognitive processes to restrict their intake as a consequence of weight concerns

This cognitive restriction of food intake is predicted to lead to overeating when dietary restraint breaks down.

The Three Factor Eating Questionnaire (Stunkard 1985) measures restrained eating.

Question 7

What measures restrained eating?

Answer 7

The Three Factor Eating Questionnaire (Stunkard 1985)

Question 8

What is Emotional Eating theory?

Answer 8

Emotional eating occurs in response to negative emotions in an attempt to distract attention from, or alleviate, these feelings.

Question 9

In emotional eating- what is food seen to be?

Answer 9

A temporary mood enhancer.

Question 10

Measuring food-related attention

How can you measure it?

Answer 10

Food dot probe task

Question 11

Measuring food-related attention

How would you carry out the dot probe task?

Answer 11

Paired stimuli: one food-related, one control, displayed for fixed time
Neutral “dot” probe may appear in either location immediately after visual cues
Measure is Reaction Time (RT) to probe.

Question 12

Measuring food-related attention- dot probe task

What would the Attentional bias for food cues be?

Answer 12

Faster reaction time (RT) when probe and food cue are in same location but slower RT when locations differ.

Question 13

How else can you measure food related attention- other than the dot probe task?

Answer 13

food stroop task

Question 14

What are the ways of measuring food related attention?

Answer 14

Dot probe task
Food stroop task

Question 15

In the food stroop task- what would the attentional bias for food cues be?

Answer 15

Slower colour-naming time for food-related items compared with neutral stimuli

Question 16

Aberrant attention in obesity?

Answer 16

Preferential allocation of of attention to food cues even when not hungry- & (see advert for food & are drawn to it)

Heightened emotional response to Food cues- (want to eat the food)

Stronger approach tendencies-

Overeating & obesity

Question 17

What do high levels of exposure to food items cause?

Answer 17

Cause you to want to eat.

Question 18

What has research found?

Answer 18

Attentional bias for food-related cues have been found in obese adults (e.g. Nijs et al, 2010; Werthmann, 2011, Dekuchi 2017) & obese children (Braet and Crombez, 2003; Yokum et al, 2011), 2011)

Question 19

How many studies have there been on biases in obesity/ overweight? & what have they found?

Answer 19

Nearly 30 studies on biases in obese/overweight. Meta-analyses reliably confirm NO evidence of greater attention in obesity

Question 20

What are food related biases reliably associated with?

Answer 20

Hunger state (will pay attention to food cues if hungry)

Food intake (how much you have eaten already)

Food craving (cues in environment make you want to crave food)

Certain eating disorders (certain biases in certain disorders)

Question 21

Is attentional capacity limited/ not limited?

Answer 21

Limited

Question 22

Attentional capacity

What are the possible implications for appetite control?

Answer 22

Inattention while eating could promote overconsumption (so-called “mindless eating”) e.g. watching TV whilst eating.

Inattention between meals may lead to poor awareness of interoceptive (ie bodily cues) relating to appetite

Question 23

Inattention while eating

What are some examples of research surrounding this?

Answer 23

Eating while distracted (e.g. TV watching) consistently leads to greater intake, and poorer
memory of what was consumed (Robinson et al., 2013).

Obese children on average spend more time in sedentary (sitting down) behaviours and high TV viewing associated with higher intake (e.g. Crespo et al., 2001)

Time watching TV associated with average 1.3x obesity risk in children (Ghobadi et al., 2018)

Question 24

For children watching TV whilst eating- how many more time likely will they be obese?

Answer 24

1.3x

Question 25

Inattention & hunger study- uni of sussex (Morris et al., 2020)
What happened in the study?

Answer 25

Participants entered study- while after breakfast. (they rated their appetite).
Completed an online cognitive task- a perceptual load task- which was either very difficult/ easy.
While doing this- there was a tube inserted into their mouth which they could infuse a drink through (either high/ low calorie energy drink).
They drink the solution whilst doing the task & carry on with task after finishing the drink.
Immediately after- they rate their hunger & are given crisps they can eat- then they measure how much they ate.

Findings: