When food becomes an obsession

Participants with a healthy weight (n = 27) and participants who were overweight (n = 33) filled out the Yale-Brown-Cornell Eating Disorder Scale, the Eating Obsessive-Compulsive Scale, and the Emotional and Behavioral Reactions to Intrusions Questionnaire to assess frequency, distress, control, and reactance associated with food-related preoccupations and compulsions.

Overweight participants showed increased food-related preoccupations, compulsive eating, and heightened emotional and behavioral reactance compared to participants with a healthy weight. Increased food-related obsessive-compulsiveness was also associated with unhealthy eating patterns.