An exploratory examination of mindfulness, self-compassion, and mindful eating in relation to motivations to eat palatable foods and BMI

Abstract

health psychology report · 8 original article background Preliminary findings suggest that mindfulness and selfcompassion training are associated with enhanced weight regulation. However, the associations between these traits and body mass index (BMI) are mixed. participants and procedureIn a cross-sectional investigation, university students (n = 183) were asked to fill in questionnaires on mindfulness, self-compassion, mindful eating, and motivations to eat palatable foods. resultsThe results suggest that mindfulness, self-compassion and mindful eating related negatively to motivations to eat palatable foods. Mindful eating displayed the most significant relationship. Further investigations showed that some subscales of self-compassion, mindfulness and mindful eating related to motivations to eat palatable foods and BMI more significantly. The ability to draw more and better conclusions by investigating the relationship of subscales to health behaviors and outcomes, especially with self-compassion, has been noted in previous rationales and theories. The notable relationships were (a) the enhancement subscale of the motivations to eat palatable foods, which appeared to relate positively to self-judgment, isolation, and over-identification, while (b) the coping subscale related to all subscales within the self-compassion scale. conclusionsThe current findings support different lines of research that suggest that mindful eating, mindfulness and/or self-compassion support weight regulation. Mindfulness practices could potentially add the right motives to eat palatable foods (such as being motivated to eat when people are hungry), and potentially eat less of the foods that lead to weight dysregulation. The findings are discussed and suggested paths for further research are recommended. Based on a recent review exploring the relationship between self-compassion and obesity (see Mantzios & Egan, 2017), it was suggested that reporting findings from the subscales of those traits might offer further insights. Another review suggested investigating mindful eating more specifically, to identify more relevant and useful associations in obesity research (Mantzios & Wilson, 2015a). The overall aim of this research is to clarify the relationship of mindfulness, mindful eating and self-compassion to BMI through the use of a recent scale that assesses the motivations behind eating palatable foods. The relationship of mindfulness, mindful eating and self-compassion with motivations to eat palatable foods has not been explored, and might offer supplementary understanding of their association with BMI. Two methods of investigation have been used in this research. First, BMI is explored with the overall scores of mindfulness, mindful eating, and self-compassion, while considering the association with motivations to eat palatable foods. Second, BMI is explored in relation to the subscales of the mindfulness, mindful eating, self-compassion and motivations to eat palatable foods scales. Mindfulness, eating, and oBesityThe practice...

Gender and Body-Fat Status as Predictors of Parental Feeding Styles and Children’s Nutritional Knowledge, Eating Habits and Behaviours

“…Children at an early age have a tendency to avoid novel foods [ 1 ] and they have an innate predisposition to prefer sweet and salty tastes [ 51 ], and energy-dense foods [ 52 ]. Cross-cultural research indicates that children, unsurprisingly, prefer fries, pizza and ice-cream over meals with better nutritional value [ 13 , 35 , 53 ] and that these preferences are fairly stable over time [ 13 ] unless modified by parents [ 54 ]. If not exposed to a variety of foods and encouraged to taste unfamiliar flavours, children’s preferences will remain limited and they will continue to favour food of low nutritional value like snacks and sugared drinks [ 55 , 56 ].…”

A Randomised Experiment Evaluating the Mindful Raisin Practice as a Method of Reducing Chocolate Consumption During and After a Mindless Activity

“…Mindful eating assists in the gradual change of external eating and environmentally driven responses to food to internal decision-making and eating, promoting healthier eating behaviours (Mantzios andWilson 2014, 2015a;Mantzios and Giannou 2014), such as a decrease in external and emotional eating (Warren et al 2017;O'Reilly et al 2014), an increased intake of fruit and vegetables (Dutt et al 2018;Gilbert & Waltz, 2010), as well as a reduction in the consumption of high-sugar and energy-dense foods (Mason et al 2016). Research has found a negative association between mindful eating and fat and sugar consumption (Mantzios et al 2018a, b), grazing (Mantzios et al 2018a, b), motivations to eat palatable foods (Mantzios and Egan 2018), as well as weight gain (Mantzios, Wilson, Linnell & Morris, 2014). Overall, mindfulness specific to eating rather than mindfulness targeting more generically the self-regulation of attention has been found to be more effective in improving eating behaviours (Mantzios and Wilson 2015b;O'Reilly et al 2014).…”

How does mindful eating without non-judgement, mindfulness and self-compassion relate to motivations to eat palatable foods in a student population?

“…Accordingly, Mantzios and Egan (2018) suggested that mindfulness, mindful eating and self-compassion enable and assist weight regulation through negative associations to motives to eat palatable foods, and implications for potential interventions to regulate food consumption. The practice of mindfulness is defined as an awareness that emerges through purposefully paying attention in the present moment, non-judgementally (Kabat-Zinn, 1990), with research acknowledging that being mindfully aware of food is helpful in regulating cravings and eating (e.g.…”