Depression is an emerging risk factor for
obesity; however, it is unclear whether certain depressive symptoms drive this
relationship. Recent evidence suggests that atypical major depressive disorder (MDD)
– whose key features include the reversed somatic-vegetative symptoms of hyperphagia
(increased appetite) and hypersomnia (increased sleep) – is a stronger
predictor of future obesity than other MDD subtypes. The present study sought to
examine food attentional bias (increased attention to food cues), emotional
eating (eating in response to negative emotions), and external eating (eating
in response to external food cues) as candidate mechanisms of the
depression-to-obesity relationship. This cross-sectional laboratory study
hypothesized that total depressive symptom severity, hyperphagia severity, and
hypersomnia severity would all be positively associated with measures of food
attentional bias, emotional eating, and external eating. Data were collected
from a sample of 95 undergraduate students. Depressive symptom severity was
measured using the Hopkins Symptom Checklist (SCL-20); two measures of food
attentional bias were obtained from eye tracking with high calorie food images:
direction bias and duration bias; and emotional eating and external eating were
assessed using the Dutch Eating Behavior Questionnaire. Simultaneous regression
models (adjusted for age, sex, race/ethnicity, body mass index, and subjective
hunger) revealed total depressive symptom severity and hypersomnia severity
were not associated with measures of food attentional bias, while hyperphagia
severity was negatively associated with direction bias but not associated with
duration bias for high and low calorie food images. Findings related to
emotional and external eating are consistent with previous literature: total
depressive symptom severity and hyperphagia severity were positively associated
with both emotional eating and external eating, and the pattern of results
suggests that hyperphagia may be driving relationships between depressive
symptoms and these eating behaviors. Hypersomnia severity was not associated
with emotional eating and external eating, suggesting this symptom does not
play an important role in the relationships between depressive symptoms and
these eating behaviors. Future studies should examine prospective associations
of hyperphagia severity with food attentional bias, emotional eating, and
external eating in larger, more representative samples.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:purdue.edu/oai:figshare.com:article/8026178 |
| Date | 15 May 2019 |
| Creators | Aubrey Lynn Shell (6622241) |
| Source Sets | Purdue University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, Thesis |
| Rights | CC BY 4.0 |
| Relation | https://figshare.com/articles/Depressive_Symptoms_and_Eating_Behaviors_Do_Atypical_Symptoms_Drive_Associations_With_Food_Attentional_Bias_Emotional_Eating_and_External_Eating_/8026178 |
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