Emotional eating, food craving acceptance, and eating disorder psychopathology in young adults: A cross-sectional analysis

Abstract

This cross-sectional study examined whether emotional eating, food craving acceptance, sex, and BMI predict eating disorder psychopathology in 531 Turkish university students (262 male, 269 female). Participants completed the Salzburg Emotional Eating Scale (SEES), Food Craving Acceptance and Action Questionnaire (FAAQ), and Eating Disorder Examination Questionnaire (EDE-Q). Males scored higher on emotional eating; females scored higher on food craving acceptance and EDE-Q. Several sex differences, including the EDE-Q global score, were not significant after Bonferroni correction or under the Turkish three-factor scoring. In a hierarchical regression, psychological variables added 10.7% of the variance beyond the 5.1% from sex and BMI (adjusted R 2 = 0.148). Higher SEES (beta = 0.227), higher FAAQ Acceptance (beta = 0.256), and female sex (male = 1; beta = -0.175) predicted higher EDE-Q; FAAQ Willingness and BMI did not. In an exploratory interaction, however, BMI predicted higher EDE-Q in males only. FAAQ findings warrant caution given moderate internal consistency.