Comparison of a gratitude-based and cognitive restructuring intervention for body dissatisfaction and dysfunctional eating behavior in college women

Abstract

Researchers have investigated the efficacy of a gratitude intervention for decreasing body dissatisfaction (BD) in an internet treatment-seeking sample and demonstrated it worked equally well to decrease BD as cognitive restructuring. We extend this research by testing the efficacy of a gratitude intervention on BD, along with common sequelae of BD: dysfunctional eating, negative mood, and depressive symptoms. Females were randomly assigned to Gratitude, Cognitive Restructuring, or Control conditions. Pre- to post-intervention period comparisons found the gratitude intervention to perform better than the other conditions at increasing body esteem, decreasing BD, reducing dysfunctional eating, and reducing depressive symptoms.

The effectiveness of interventions aiming to promote positive body image in adults: A systematic review

“…The EPHPP assessment (Thomas et al, 2004; see Table 3) revealed that the methodological quality of studies was mixed. Six studies were classified as weak, implying a high risk of bias (Albertson et al, 2015;Duarte et al, 2017;Jankowski et al, 2017;Mellor et al, 2017;Pinto-Gouveia et al, 2017;Pinto et al, 2003), six as moderate (Ahmadi et al, 2017;Annesi, 2005;Rodgers et al, 2018;Toole & Craighead, 2016;Wolfe & Patterson, 2017) and three (by the same author and using the same intervention) as strong, implying a low risk of bias (Alleva, Diedrichs, Halliwell, Martijn, et al, 2018;Alleva, Diedrichs, Halliwell, Peters, et al, 2018;Alleva, Martijn, et al, 2015).…”

“…The studies took place in six countries: seven in the USA (Albertson et al, 2015;Annesi, 2005;Bush, Rossy, Mintz, & Schopp, 2014;Pinto, Clark, Maruyama, & Feder, 2003;Rodgers et al, 2018;Toole & Craighead, 2016;Wolfe & Patterson, 2017), three in the UK (Alleva, Diedrichs, Halliwell, Martijn, et al, 2018;Alleva, Diedrichs, Halliwell, Peters, et al, 2018;Jankowski et al, 2017), two in Portugal (Duarte, Pinto-Gouveia, & Stubbs, 2017;Pinto-Gouveia et al, 2017), and one study in Australia (Mellor, Connaughton, McCabe, & Tatangelo, 2017), Iran (Ahmadi, Abbaspoor, Behroozy, & Malehi, 2017), and the Netherlands (Alleva, Martijn, et al, 2015). There was significant variation in sample size between the studies, ranging from 20 to 274 participants (M = 105.7).…”

“…Thus, most of the sample were classified as adults. Nonetheless, most studies (n = 12) used women-only samples (Ahmadi et al, 2017;Albertson et al, 2015;Alleva, Diedrichs, Halliwell, Martijn, et al, 2018;Alleva, Diedrichs, Halliwell, Peters, et al, 2018;Alleva, Martijn, et al, 2015;Annesi, 2005;Bush et al, 2014;Duarte et al, 2017;Pinto-Gouveia et al, 2017;Pinto et al, 2003;Toole & Craighead, 2016;Wolfe & Patterson, 2017).…”

“…The most commonly used intervention approaches were self-compassion-based (n = 5) (Albertson et al, 2015;Duarte et al, 2017;Pinto-Gouveia et al, 2017;Rodgers et al, 2018;Toole & Craighead, 2016), functionality-based (n = 3) (Alleva, Diedrichs, Halliwell, Martijn, et al, 2018;Alleva, Diedrichs, Halliwell, Peters, et al, 2018;Alleva, Martijn, et al, 2015), and most employed some aspects of psychoeducation. Eight were self-directed (Alleva, Diedrichs, Halliwell, Martijn, et al, 2018;Alleva, Diedrichs, Halliwell, Peters, et al, 2018;Alleva, Martijn, et al, 2015;Annesi, 2005;Pinto et al, 2003;Rodgers et al, 2018;Toole & Craighead, 2016;Wolfe & Patterson, 2017) and seven were group-based (Bush et al, 2014;Duarte et al, 2017;Jankowski et al, 2017;Mellor et al, 2017).…”

“…Both involved sessions three times a week for 12weeks. One study (Wolfe & Patterson, 2017) evaluated two workbook-based interventions using cognitive restructuring and gratitude approaches; workbook activities were completed daily for two weeks.…”