Exploring the Impact of Mood States on Motivation to Consume Food and Non-Food Rewards in Individuals with Loss of Control Eating
Abstract
Introduction. Loss of control (LOC) eating episodes are eating episodes in which an individual feels they cannot control what or how much they are eating, regardless of the amount of food consumed. These episodes are associated with significant psychological distress, psychiatric comorbidity, and reduced quality of living. Both negative affect and heightened reward processing of food have been posited as mechanisms that contribute to LOC eating. However, few studies have investigated whether negative affect influences reward processing of food and/or non-food rewards in individuals with LOC eating. Understanding how purported mechanisms of LOC work in conjunction may help to identify more accurate risk states for LOC eating and better inform treatment targets. Methods. Participants (N = 46) with LOC eating underwent either a negative or a neutral mood induction prior to performing two behavioral tasks assessing motivation to consume food and non-food rewards. Specifically, the tasks measured the amount of effort participants were willing to expend to receive either chocolate candies or a leisure reward (i.e., the opportunity to play the Angry Birdsgame on a computer for one minute). Mixed ANOVAs were conducted to assess whether participants with LOC eating would expend more effort (i.e., in the form of greater number of keyboard presses) for food rewards relative to leisure rewards and whether this effect would be greater when participants were in a negative (vs. neutral) mood state. Results. We failed to find main effects of mood condition or reward type or an interaction between mood and reward type on the amount of effort expended F(1,44) = 0.4, p = 0.53, ηp2 = .01. Conclusion. Results suggest that mood states may not increase motivation for food in individuals with LOC eating; however, limitations with sample size prohibit strong conclusions from being drawn.