Relationships between eating disorder-specific and transdiagnostic risk factors for binge eating: An integrative moderated mediation model of emotion regulation, anticipatory reward, and expectancy

Abstract

Although relationships between negative affect, emotion dysregulation, and binge eating have been well-established, the mechanisms and individual risk factors that account for this relationship have yet to be elucidated. In addition to emotion dysregulation, altered reward functioning and negative affect eating expectancies (i.e., the expectancy that eating will relieve negative affect) are factors that have been previously linked to binge eating, though theoretical frameworks have not provided an integrated conceptualization of relationships between these domains. Therefore, the present study examined an integrative moderated mediation model among a sample of 101 adults with self-reported eating disorder (ED) symptoms who completed a battery of online questionnaires. Results supported the hypothesized model, which demonstrated that eating expectancies mediated the relationship between emotion dysregulation and binge eating frequency, and there was a positive association between emotion dysregulation and eating expectancies among individuals high in anticipatory reward. These findings provide preliminary support for an integrated approach to understanding transdiagnostic and ED-specific risk factors that potentiate binge eating.

Keywords: Binge eating; Eating expectancy; Emotion regulation; Reward.

Figure 1.

Hypothesized moderated mediation model predicting that negative affect eating expectancies would mediate the relationship between emotion regulation difficulties and binge eating, and that anticipatory reward would moderate paths between emotion regulation difficulties and eating expectancies (a), and between eating expectancies and binge eating (b).

Figure 2.

Statistical moderated-mediation model with unstandardized estimates. Solid lines represent p<.05, and dashed lines represent p≥.05. Age is included as a covariate. Together results demonstrated that negative affect eating expectancy mediated the relationship between emotion dysregulation and binge eating, though the interaction between anticipatory reward and emotion regulation difficulties indicated this model was only significant among individuals high in anticipatory reward.

Figure 3.

Interaction between emotion regulation difficulties and anticipatory reward in relation to negative affect eating expectancies.