title: Mindfulness and eating behaviour styles in morbidly obese males and females.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Morbid obesity is a highly prevalent condition that is associated with a high risk of various diseases and high health care costs. Understanding determinants of eating behaviours that are characteristic of many morbidly obese persons is important for the development of new interventions aimed at changing eating behaviour after bariatric surgery. Dispositional mindfulness seems promising as one such potential determinant. Therefore, the association between mindfulness and eating behaviour was examined in females and males with morbid obesity.
  
  
  METHODS
  Outpatients with morbid obesity who were candidates for bariatric surgery (N = 335; 78.8% female) completed the Dutch Eating Behaviour Questionnaire (DEBQ), the Freiburg Mindfulness Inventory (FMI) and the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS), in addition to the collection of relevant demographic and medical data.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Three separate multiple regression analyses with three eating behaviour styles (restrained, emotional, external) as dependent variables showed that mindfulness was positively associated with restrained eating behaviour (Beta = .28, p ≤ .001), and negatively associated with emotional (Beta = -.22, p ≤ .001) and external (Beta = -.32, p ≤ .001) eating behaviours, independent of sex, age, educational level, Body Mass Index and affective symptoms.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Dispositional mindfulness was associated with more restrained, and less emotional and external eating behaviour in morbidly obese outpatients, above and beyond affective symptoms. Future studies, establishing the causal direction of the associations, are needed.
authors.affiliation: Center of Research on Psychology in Somatic diseases (CoRPS), Department of Medical and Clinical Psychology, Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands; Currently at GGz Breburg, Tilburg, The Netherlands. Electronic address: machteldouwens@gmail.com.
authors.forename: M A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Ouwens
authors.affiliation: Department of Medical Psychology, Elisabeth-TweeSteden Hospital, Tilburg/Waalwijk, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: A A
authors.initials: AA
authors.lastname: Schiffer
authors.affiliation: Department of Medical Psychology, Elisabeth-TweeSteden Hospital, Tilburg/Waalwijk, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: L I
authors.initials: LI
authors.lastname: Visser
authors.affiliation: Department of Dietetics, Elisabeth-TweeSteden Hospital, Tilburg/Waalwijk, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: N J C
authors.initials: NJ
authors.lastname: Raeijmaekers
authors.affiliation: Center of Research on Psychology in Somatic diseases (CoRPS), Department of Medical and Clinical Psychology, Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: I
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Nyklíček
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000342:Affective Symptoms; D050110:Bariatric Surgery; D015992:Body Mass Index; D004435:Eating / Q000523:psychology*; D004644:Emotions; D005247:Feeding Behavior / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D006963:Hyperphagia / Q000523:psychology; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D064866:Mindfulness; D009767:Obesity, Morbid / Q000523:psychology*; D010551:Personality; D012927:Social Control, Informal; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires
keywords: Anxiety; Depression; Dispositional mindfulness; Eating behaviour; Eating styles; Morbid obesity