Updated
April 30, 2013
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These research findings illustrate several useful things
about the media and widespread easting disorders and
self-neglect. See
my comments after the article
-
Peter
Gerlach, MSW
+ + +
Emotional eaters -- people who eat when they are lonely
or blue -- tend to lose the least amount of weight and
have the hardest time keeping it off, U.S. researchers
said on Thursday.
They said the study may explain why so many people who
lose weight gain it all back.
"We found that the more people report eating in response
to thoughts and feelings, the less weight they lost,"
Heather Niemeier, an obesity researcher at The Miriam
Hospital and The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown
University, said in a statement.
"Amongst
successful weight losers, those who report emotional
eating are more likely to regain," said Niemeier,
whose study appears in the journal
Obesity.
The study included 286 overweight men and women who were
participating in a behavioral weight loss program.
A second group consisted of more than 3,300 adults who
have lost at least 30 pounds and kept it off for at
least one year.
Niemeier and her team analyzed responses to an eating
inventory questionnaire.
They focused on people who ate because of external
influences, such as people who eat too much at parties,
and people who ate because of internal influences, such
as feeling lonely or as a reward.
What they found
is that
the more a
person ate for internal reasons, the less weight they
lost over time.
"Our results suggest that we need to pay more attention
to eating triggered by emotions or thoughts as they
clearly play a significant role in weight loss,"
Niemeier said.
The study was funded by a grant from the National
Institutes of Health.
Copyright © 2007 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
Comments
The main value of this NIH study
is in implying the need for deeper exploration of a
cluster of questions like these:
-
why
does eating comfort some "emotional" people?
-
does
the comfort come from certain foods, or the
process of eating, or both?
-
why are
some people more "emotional" than others?
-
which specific emotions promote
unhealthy eating?
-
does
grief ("feeling blue") promote unhealthy eating?
-
why do
these emotions trigger overeating in some people but
not others?
-
why do
some people neglect their health, despite "knowing
better"?
-
what
causes compulsive behavior - specially if it's
unhealthy?
can impulse control and self-nurturance be learned?
is self-neglect related to shame ("low self
esteem")?
in this educational Web sits proposes answers to most of
these questions, based on my
36
years' clinical research.
The study
authors conclude "...we (Americans) need to pay more
attention to (self-comforting) eating" and "weight
control." Like many other researchers, they stopped
short of examining
why so many adults and kids
are self-neglectful, and need to distract and comfort themselves with
toxic compulsions like overeating. We
really need to understand and promote
self-nurturance by promoting qualified child conception
and
Notice what you're
now. Recall why you read this - did you get what you
needed? If so,
what do you need to do now? If not, what
you
need? Who's
these questions - your wise
resident
or
For more
perspective, see these related research summaries:
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Updated
April 30, 2013
The Web address of this article is
https://sfhelp.org/gwc/news/emotional_eaters.htm