Background. Individuals with anorexia nervosa (AN) are often thought to show heightened selfcontrol and increased ability to inhibit desires. In addition to inhibitory self-control, antecedentfocused strategies (e.g., cognitive reconstrual—the re-evaluation of tempting situations) might contribute to disorder maintenance and enable disorder-typical, maladaptive behaviors. - Methods. Over a period of 14 days, 40 acutely underweight young female patients with anorexia nervosa (AN) and 40 healthy control (HC) participants reported their affect and behavior in selfcontrol situations via ecological momentary assessment during inpatient treatment (AN) and everyday life (HC). Data were analyzed via hierarchical analyses (linear and logistic modeling). - Results. Conflict strength had a significantly lower impact on self-control success in AN compared to HC. While AN and HC did not generally differ in the number or strength of self-control conflicts or in the percentage of self-control success, AN reported self-controlled behavior to be less dependent on conflict strength. - Conclusions. While patients with AN were not generally more successful at self-control, they appeared to resolve self-control conflicts more effectively. These findings suggest that the magnitude of self-control conflicts has comparatively little impact on individuals with AN, possibly due to the use of antecedent-focused strategies. If confirmed, cognitive-behavioral therapy might focus on and help patients to exploit these alternative self-control strategies in the battle against their illness.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:DRESDEN/oai:qucosa:de:qucosa:90461 |
| Date | 04 April 2024 |
| Creators | Fürtjes, Sophia, Seidel, Maria, Diestel, Stefan, Wolff, Max, King, Joseph A., Hellerhoff, Inger, Bernadoni, Fabio, Gramatke, Katrin, Goschke, Thomas, Roessner, Veit, Ehrlich, Stefan |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press |
| Source Sets | Hochschulschriftenserver (HSSS) der SLUB Dresden |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion, doc-type:article, info:eu-repo/semantics/article, doc-type:Text |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
| Relation | 1778-3585, e39, 10.1192/j.eurpsy.2022.29 |
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