Difficulties in emotion regulation across the spectrum of eating disorders

‘I can’t accept that feeling’: Relationships between interoceptive awareness, mindfulness and eating disorder symptoms in females with, and at-risk of an eating disorder

“…Additionally, high impulsivity was related to lower dispositional mindfulness, bulimia, emotion dysregulation and interoceptive deficits, but not with drive-for-thinness. This outcome is in accord with well-established evidence that impulse control is a feature of bulimia (Brockmeyer et al, 2014;Waxman, 2009). We found support for similar relations in our clinical and non-clinical samples.…”

“…Although there is ample evidence of the relationship between impulsivity as measured by the BIS-11 and symptoms of anorexia and bulimia nervosa (Farstad, McGeown, & von Ranson, 2016;Meule, 2013) this evidence pertains to impulsivity as a broader personality construct and not as a facet of emotion regulation as conceived by Gratz & Roemer (2004). By using the DERS-IMP in place of the BIS-11 in study 3 we created the opportunity to examine impulse control as a facet of emotion regulation in accord with recent conceptualisations of its presentation in eating disorders (Brockmeyer et al, 2014;Lavender & Anderson, 2010;. The internal consistency of all study measures were found to be in the acceptable range (see Table 4).…”

“…Similar conceptualisations highlight awareness, goals and strategies as features of adaptive emotion regulation (Gross & Jazaieri, 2014). Maladaptive emotion regulation, widely referred to as emotion dysregulation, is a key psychological characteristic of all eating disorders and is increasingly viewed as a transdiagnostic risk and/or maintenance factor rather than being disorder specific (Brockmeyer et al, 2014;Lavender et al, 2014;Merwin, 2011;Merwin et al, 2011;Svaldi, Griepenstroh, TuschenCaffier, & Ehring, 2012).…”

“…Evidence is accumulating regarding the specific nature of emotion regulation difficulties in eating disorders (Brockmeyer et al, 2014;Butryn et al, 2013;Garner, 2004;Haynos & Fruzzetti, 2011;Lavender et al, 2014;Merwin, 2011;Racine & Wildes, 2013) and the potential therapeutic benefits of MBTs for eating related disorders has received increased empirical support (DeSole, 2013;Godsey, 2013;Katterman, Kleinman, Hood, Nackers, & Corsica, 2014;Kristeller & Epel, 2014;O'Reilly, Cook, Spruijt-Metz, & Black, 2014;Wanden-Berghe, Sanz-Valero, & Wanden-Berghe, 2011). …”

“…Impulsivity differentiates between individuals with eating disorders and controls and is implicated as a either a causal or moderating factor in eating disorder symptom expression (Waxman, 2009). Recent reviews and empirical studies highlight how impulsivity, especially impulse control, as defined in the multidimensional emotion regulation model (Gratz & Roemer, 2004) is expressed differentially in clinical samples across eating disorders (Brockmeyer et al, 2014;. Additionally in non-clinical individuals lower dispositional mindfulness is related to greater emotional eating associated with eating disorders yet this relationship is mediated by impulsivity (Lattimore, Fisher, & Malinowski, 2011), and is strongly related to different facets of impulsivity after controlling for negative affect and psychological distress (Peters, Shannon, Upton, Baer, & Roemer, 2011).…”