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Oct 30, 2023 · Emotional eating or emotional hunger is often a craving for high-calorie or high-carbohydrate foods that have minimal nutritional value. The foods that emotional eaters crave are often referred to as comfort foods, such as: About 40% of people tend to eat more when stressed, while about 40% eat less, and 20% experience no change in the amount ...
May 2, 2023 · While every eating disorder has its own characteristics and symptoms, all eating disorders are about abnormal eating habits and dysfunctional relationships with food. Some common signs of an eating disorder include: Extreme weight loss or gain relative to your personal history. Fear of gaining weight. Preoccupation with food, body weight and ...
Emotion-focused therapy (EFT), sometimes called emotionally-focused therapy, is a type of therapy that focuses on gaining and improving emotional awareness, regulation, acceptance, and expression in order to heal and facilitate powerful therapeutic change. EFT is often used to treat eating disorders among other psychiatric conditions like ...
Oct 19, 2023 · eating slowly. taking small bites and savoring each one. keeping a food log and thinking about what you’re eating. If curbing the urge for emotional eating is too difficult, you may be able to ...
- Nancy Lovering
- Overview
- History of CBT for Eating Disorders
- Cognitive Model of Eating Disorders
- Components of CBT for Eating Disorders
- How Effective Is CBT for Eating Disorders?
- When CBT Doesn't Work
Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) is the leading evidence-based treatment for eating disorders. CBT is a psychotherapeutic approach that involves a variety of techniques. These approaches help an individual to understand the interaction between their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. It also helps them to develop strategies to change unhelpful thoughts and behaviors to improve mood and functioning.
At a Glance
Cognitive behavioral therapy is a first-line treatment of eating disorders. CBT focuses on helping people identify and change the thought patterns that play a role in the onset and maintenance of their condition. It also addresses areas including coping skills, low self-esteem, interpersonal problems, and perfectionism that also make eating disorder recovery more complex.
CBT can be an effective treatment for adults with bulimia, binge eating disorder, and other specified eating disorder (OSFED). However, it is essential to note that eating disorders are complex, and each person's needs are different. Other treatments, including hospitalization and residential treatment, may also be necessary.
CBT was developed in the late 1950s and 1960s by psychiatrist Aaron Beck, who emphasized the role of thoughts in influencing feelings and behaviors. CBT was initially developed to treat depression, although today it is an evidence-based treatment for many mental health conditions and symptoms, including disordered eating.
Cognitive behavioral therapy itself is not a single distinct therapeutic technique, and there are many different forms of CBT that share a common theory about the factors maintaining psychological distress. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) are examples of specific CBT treatments.
The cognitive model of eating disorders posits that the core maintaining problem in all eating disorders is overconcern with shape and weight. The specific way this overconcern manifests can vary. It can drive any of the following:
•Binge eating
•Compensatory behaviors such as self-induced vomiting, laxatives, and excessive exercise
•Low weight
•Strict dieting
Further, these components can interact to create the symptoms of an eating disorder. Strict dieting—including skipping meals, eating small amounts of food, and avoiding forbidden foods—can lead to low weight and/or binge eating. Low weight can lead to malnutrition and also can lead to binge eating.
CBT is a structured treatment. In its most common form, it consists of 20 sessions. Goals are set. Sessions are spent weighing the patient, reviewing homework, reviewing the case formulation, teaching skills, and problem-solving.
Cognitive behavioral therapy for eating disorders typically includes the following components:
•Challenge of dietary rules. This involves identifying rules and challenging them behaviorally (such as eating after 8 p.m. or eating a sandwich for lunch).
•Completion of food records immediately after eating and noting thoughts and feelings as well as behaviors.
•Development of continuum thinking to replace all-or-nothing thinking.
•Development of strategies to prevent binges and compensatory behaviors, such as the use of delays and alternatives and problem-solving strategies.
Cognitive behavioral therapy is widely considered to be the most effective therapy for the treatment of bulimia nervosa and should, therefore, usually be the initial treatment offered at the outpatient level.
Research suggets CBT is effective for bulimia nervosa and binge-eating disorders, although there is less evidence of its efficacy for treating anorexia nervosa.
One study compared five months of CBT (20 sessions) for women with bulimia nervosa with 2 years of weekly psychoanalytic psychotherapy. Seventy patients were randomly assigned to one of these two groups.
After 5 months of therapy (the end of the CBT treatment), 42% of patients in the CBT group and 6% of the patients in the psychoanalytic therapy group had stopped binge-eating and purging. At the end of 2 years (completion of the psychoanalytic therapy), 44% of the CBT group and 15% of the psychoanalytic group were symptom-free.
Another study compared CBT-E with interpersonal therapy (IPT), an alternative leading treatment for adults with an eating disorder. In the study, 130 adult patients with an eating disorder were randomly assigned to receive either CBT-E or IPT. Both treatments involved 20 sessions over 20 weeks, followed by a 60-week follow-up period.
At post-treatment, 66% of the CBT-E participants met criteria for remission, compared with only 33% of the IPT participants. Over the follow-up period, the CBT-E remission rate remained higher (69% versus 49%).
CBT is often recommended as a first-line treatment. If a trial of CBT is not successful, individuals can be referred for DBT (a specific type of CBT with greater intensity) or to a higher level of care such as partial hospitalization or residential treatment program.
If you or a loved one are coping with an eating disorder, contact the National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA) Helpline for support at 1-800-931-2237.
For more mental health resources, see our National Helpline Database.
The Best Online Therapy and Support Services for Eating Disorders
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Dec 1, 2023 · How DBT is applied in eating disorder treatment. DBT can help eating disorder patients cope with distress around meal times, regulate emotions that may trigger disordered behaviors, and specifically interrupt the binge-restrict cycle. DBT may also improve a patient’s communication skills with their support system, treatment team, and other ...
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What is emotional eating?
Nov 5, 2024 · It often involves the consumption of “comfort foods,” or overeating food high in sugar, fat, salt, or carbohydrates, as opposed to eating well-rounded, balanced meals. Emotional eating can also be referred to as stress eating, as stress is one of the most common emotional causes. It should be noted that stress is often thought of as a ...
