The telegraph
Scientists believe that comfort eating is a myth
“Comfort Eating” is a myth, according to a study that found no link between stress and binge eating. The groundbreaking discovery promises to reverse decades of established thinking about the triggers for people with eating disorders. 22 women with anorexia nervosa, 33 with bulimia nervosa, and 30 healthy controls were asked to perform mental arithmetic exercises while receiving small electric shocks. They were then invited to an All You Can Eat buffet in the Eating Behavior Department at Cambridge University. Scientists were surprised to find that women with either anorexia or bulimia generally eat less than controls. The results, published in the Journal of Neuroscience, challenge the binge eating theory that stress causes difficulty in self-control. Despite its importance, the theory has never been tested directly on patients, the authors say. Dr. Margaret Westwater, who led the research, said, “The theory is that these women should have eaten more when they were stressed, but we really didn’t find that. “When thinking about eating behavior in these disorders, we need to take a more nuanced approach.” Using blood biomarkers taken from patients at various stages during the experiment, the team found that anorexics had elevated levels of ghrelin, a hormone that tells the body that it is hungry when it is stressed. At the same time, however, there were also increased levels of the peptide tyrosine tyrosine, a satiety hormone. There were no differences in hormone levels in patients with bulimia. During their stay in the Eating Behavior Department, the women were given a controlled meal each morning provided by a nutritionist before they underwent a fast to perform tasks while their brain activity was monitored with a functional MRI scanner. The first tasks were to stop the progression of a bar displayed by pressing a button on a computer screen. To increase their stress levels, the women were asked to perform a series of mental arithmetic tests while receiving light but unpredictable electric shocks. They were told that if they did not meet the standard of performance, their data would be excluded from the study. You received feedback throughout the assignment, such as: B. “Your performance is below average”. The women then repeated the stop signal task again. After the tasks were done – but although the volunteers could still be expected to be in an increased state of stress – they were offered the buffet. Professor Paul Fletcher, co-lead author in the Department of Psychiatry, said, “Our work shows that the relationship between stress and binge eating is very complex. It’s about the environment around us, our mental state and how our body signals to us that we are hungry or full. “If we gain a better understanding of the mechanisms behind how our gut affects these higher-order cognitive processes related to self-control or decision-making, we may be better able to help people affected by these extremely debilitating diseases . To do this, we need to take a much more integrated approach to studying these diseases. “Anorexia and bulimia are largely differentiated by body mass index, with adults with a BMI less than 18.5 kg / m2 classified as anorexic. More than 1.6 million people in the UK are believed to have Sufferers of eating disorders, three quarters of whom are women. Research last year found that eating disorders are on the rise, with nearly 20,000 people being admitted to NHS hospitals annually over fears that social media is fueling an eating disorder growing crisis.