Causes of Emotional Eating and Matched Treatment of Obesity

Tatjana van Strien*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to JournalReview articleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

Purpose of the Review: Eating in response to negative emotions (EE) may be an explanatory factor of the weight regain of many dieters. This narrative review presents evidence on possible causes of EE and the association of EE with depression and obesity and discusses implications of these findings for the treatment of obesity. Recent Findings: Possible causes of EE are high dietary restraint, poor interoceptive awareness, alexithymia, emotion dysregulation and a reversed hypothalamic pituitary adrenal (HPA) stress axis. EE may be the outcome of inadequate parenting or depressive feelings in interaction with genetic susceptibility. There is also robust evidence that EE is a mediator between depression and obesity. Summary: The association of EE with depression and poor emotion regulation skills suggests that the treatment of obese people with high EE should not focus on calorie-restricted diets but on emotion regulation skills. The DEBQ (Dutch Eating Behavior Questionnaire) enables such a matched treatment of obesity.

Original languageEnglish
Article number35
Pages (from-to)1-8
Number of pages8
JournalCurrent Diabetes Reports
Volume18
Issue number6
Early online date25 Apr 2018
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Jun 2018

Funding

This article is part of the Topical Collection on Obesity Tatjana van Strien receives royalties for the DEBQ and its manual.

FundersFunder number
Radboud Universiteit

    Keywords

    • Causes
    • DEBQ
    • Depression
    • Emotional eating
    • Matched treatment
    • Obesity

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