title: Piece of cake. Cognitive reappraisal of food craving.
abstract: A common emotion regulation strategy, cognitive reappraisal, involves altering the meaning of a situation so that the emotional response to the situation is changed. Most research on reappraisal has focused on down-regulation of negative emotion; few studies exist on reappraisal of positive affect, and even fewer have examined the cognitive reappraisal of craving for energy-dense (e.g., "junk") foods. In the present study we examined this form of cognitive reappraisal using a new adaptation of a classic emotion regulation task. Subjects chose idiosyncratic categories of craved (and not craved) energy-dense foods as stimuli, and were instructed either to look at the stimulus or to reappraise it in a way that reduced desire to eat the depicted food using a strategy that could be used in the real world. A repeated-measures ANOVA and follow-up tests revealed that reappraisal significantly reduced self-reported desirability of both Craved and Not Craved foods, but for a greater degree in Craved foods. In addition, the degree to which subjects decreased their desire to consume Craved foods positively correlated with the cognitive restraint subscale of the Three-Factor Eating Questionnaire, a measure of self-control of eating in everyday life.
authors: 1227 University of Oregon, Eugene, OR 97403-1227, USA. giuliani@uoregon.edu
authors: Nicole R
authors: NR
authors: Giuliani
authors: Rebecca D
authors: RD
authors: Calcott
authors: Elliot T
authors: ET
authors: Berkman
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000339:Affect; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001066:Appetite; D003071:Cognition; D004435:Eating / Q000523:psychology*; D004644:Emotions; D002149:Energy Intake; D005247:Feeding Behavior / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D005518:Food Preferences / Q000523:psychology*; D006801:Humans; D007266:Inhibition, Psychological; D008297:Male; D012528:Satiety Response; D012927:Social Control, Informal; D055815:Young Adult