title: Implicitly assessed attitudes toward body shape and food: the moderating roles of dietary restraint and disinhibition.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Attitudes toward body shape and food play a role in the development and maintenance of dysfunctional eating behaviors. Nevertheless, they are rarely investigated together. Therefore, this study aimed to explore the interrelationships between implicitly assessed attitudes toward body shape and food and to investigate the moderating effect on these associations of interindividual differences in problematic and nonproblematic eating behaviors (i.e., flexible versus rigid cognitive control dimension of restraint, disinhibition).
  
  
  METHODS
  One hundred and twenty-one young women from the community completed two adapted versions of the Affect Misattribution Procedure to implicitly assess attitudes toward body shape (i.e., thin and overweight bodies) and food (i.e., "permitted" and "forbidden" foods), as well as the Three-Factor Eating Questionnaire to evaluate restraint and disinhibition.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The results revealed that an implicit preference for thinness was positively associated with a positive attitude toward permitted (i.e., low-calorie) foods. This congruence between implicitly assessed attitudes toward body shape and food was significant at average and high levels of flexible control (i.e., functional component of eating). Moreover, an implicit preference for thinness was also positively associated with a positive attitude toward forbidden (i.e., high-calorie) foods. This discordance between implicitly assessed attitudes was significant at average and high levels of rigid control and disinhibition (i.e., dysfunctional components of eating).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These findings shed new light on the influence of congruent or discordant implicitly assessed attitudes toward body shape and food on normal and problematic eating behaviors; clinical implications are discussed.
authors.affiliation: Psychology Department, FPSE, Cognitive Psychopathology and Neuropsychology Unit, University of Geneva, Boulevard du Pont d'Arve 40, CH-1205 Geneva, Switzerland ; Swiss Center for Affective Sciences, Campus Biotech, University of Geneva, Case Postale 60, CH-1211 Geneva 20, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Joanna Myriam
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Moussally
authors.affiliation: Psychology Department, FPSE, Cognitive Psychopathology and Neuropsychology Unit, University of Geneva, Boulevard du Pont d'Arve 40, CH-1205 Geneva, Switzerland ; Psychological Sciences Research Institute, Laboratory for Experimental Psychopathology, Catholic University of Louvain, Place Cardinal Mercier 10, B-1348 Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium.
authors.forename: Joël
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Billieux
authors.affiliation: Psychology Department, FPSE, Cognitive Psychopathology and Neuropsychology Unit, University of Geneva, Boulevard du Pont d'Arve 40, CH-1205 Geneva, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Olivia
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Mobbs
authors.affiliation: Mental Health and Psychiatry Department, Addictology Division, Geneva University Hospitals, Rue Grand-Pré 70C, CH-1202 Geneva, Switzerland ; Geneva School of Economics and Management, Research Center for Statistics, University of Geneva, Boulevard du Pont d'Arve 40, CH-1205 Geneva, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Stéphane
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Rothen
authors.affiliation: Psychology Department, FPSE, Cognitive Psychopathology and Neuropsychology Unit, University of Geneva, Boulevard du Pont d'Arve 40, CH-1205 Geneva, Switzerland ; Swiss Center for Affective Sciences, Campus Biotech, University of Geneva, Case Postale 60, CH-1211 Geneva 20, Switzerland ; Cognitive Sciences Department, Cognitive Psychopathology Unit, University of Liège, Boulevard du Rectorat B33 (TriFacultaire), 4000 Liège, Belgium.
authors.forename: Martial
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Van der Linden
keywords: Body shape; Disinhibition; Food; Implicitly assessed attitudes; Restraint