Abstract
In this study, we hypothesized that overweight/obese persons have an exaggerated approach tendency toward high calorie foods. Testing this hypothesis, a stimulus response compatibility (SRC) task was used to assess approach-avoidance tendencies toward food in both overweight/obese participants (n = 42), and normal weight controls (n = 46). The SRC task is a reaction time task measuring how fast one approaches and avoids pictures of food and non-foods according to given instructions. It was found that overweight/obese men are slower at avoiding particularly high calorie snack foods. But this does not appear to be the case for overweight/obese women who showed nearly as fast avoidance as approach toward the high calorie food cues. It is concluded that overweight/obese women, rather than men, are ambivalent toward high calorie foods, which is the likely result of high dietary restraint. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 126-130 |
Journal | Eating Behaviors |
Volume | 12 |
Issue number | 2 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 1 Jan 2011 |