What is emotional eating? Interview with Adrian Quevedo

Food encompasses a large part of our quality of life and well-being, and that is why in the In recent years, society has been giving more attention to the need to take care of oneself in this aspect from day to day. day. However, gaining awareness about the importance of a need does not imply knowing how to attend to it well, and sometimes the remedy is worse than the disease: miraculous diets, excessive help, etc.

After all, food does not only mean introducing food into our body; it also includes eating habits and the actions we take when eating. That's why, the concept of emotional eating has emerged to draw attention to the need to eat as the body really needs it.

• Related article: "Eating psychology: definition and applications"

Interview with Adrián Quevedo: how to understand what emotional eating is

Adrián Quevedo Rico is a General Health Psychologist based in Madrid and trained in sports psychology and Conscious Eating. In this interview he talks to us about what emotional eating is from his experience as a professional dedicated to helping people.

How would you define emotional eating?

First of all, I think it is important to emphasize that food and emotions go hand in hand, since food can generate the appearance of emotions and in turn emotions the appearance of hunger, so they are related to each other and many times not being aware of it takes away the possibility of choosing whether or not to eat a food.

I understand eating or emotional eating as the way to eat to regulate some kind of emotion, sensation, unpleasant or pleasant event that the person is experiencing. In the event that it produces relief or avoidance of discomfort, a negative reinforcement of this behavior, while, on the other hand, successes or joys with food can also be positively reinforced.

Authors such as Perpiña emphasize the emotional regulation of both pleasant and negative emotions. unpleasant, and in Match research we found a difference between compulsive and binge eating. emotional. In the compulsive form, it is not so much the type of food that matters but the quantity, while in the emotionally, the type of food is also important, especially sweets and foods rich in fats.

Now, this hunger or emotional eating has been criticized, judged, rejected and devalued, when apart from its "negative" polarity it has its "positive" or functional polarity. Eating a sweet when we have had a hard day, a piece of chocolate, a hot dish when we feel sad, a dish that comforts us... it is also something functional and adaptive if it is done with awareness of it, not letting ourselves be carried away by automatic behavior.

Occasionally a food can comfort us, and that's fine; the problem appears when that behavior becomes a pattern, they are automated and we lose control over it.

The difference between when we are aware of it and when we are not, is given by whether we eat it automatically and compulsively, or consciously. By realizing the food we are eating, perceiving its flavor and textures, we can do it in a relaxed way, choosing the amount we want to eat.

Therefore, emotional eating is neither negative nor positive per se, it simply fulfills a function of the The way in which we develop this process consciously and voluntarily will depend on whether it benefits us or harm

In your opinion, does it have to do with the lack of ability to correctly identify the emotions that are being felt at all times?

On the one hand, yes, but not exclusively. It is true that if we look at the scientific literature and clinical practice, we can observe how one of The important factors that predispose to eating disorders are low or deficient emotional intelligence, among many others. others.

When people feel an emotion, we feel it in the body, and from it a series of sensations are derived that our mind interprets and contextualizes. To identify an emotion, the first step will be to bring our attention to the body and begin to observe and feel the signals that it begins to send.

Every emotion is associated with a response pattern in our body, either by biology or by learning, that is, prior to experiencing the emotion. signals fully appear in our body, such as tension, sensation of heat, cold, pressure, tension, distension, activation, deactivation etc.. It is important not to confuse this with value judgments of whether I like a sensation or not, whether it is pleasant or unpleasant.

These signs are indications of the appearance of an emotion, and to the extent that we know how to identify and interpret them, we will be able to process it in our body, and come to contextualize in our mind what emotion it is, and listen to its message, the need that reflects.

Most of the time this task consists of identifying, digesting that emotion, allowing it to pass through our body, listening to it, accessing the need that lies underneath... All emotions fulfill a function, and to the extent that we allow them to fulfill it and do not reject them, they will leave room for a new one, while if we reject them they will roll into a ball until they explode at the least expected moment, or leading us to patterns of emotional management harmful.

How does emotional eating come to establish itself as one more habit in our day to day?

Eating is a habit that we carry out between 2 and 6 times every day, whose main function is to obtain the necessary nutrients for the proper functioning of our body and mind. Managing our emotions is another habit or process that we carry out every day, whose main functions are adaptation to the environment, communication to the outside and from within, and giving us the necessary energy to move to the action.

However, the feeding process also fulfills a hedonic or pleasure function, that is, eat something for the pleasure or reward we feel when eating it, even if it is not especially nutritious. So it no longer has exclusively that value for survival.

Habits give people structure, they fulfill a function, a why, and in this case, turning emotional eating into a habit is not it is more than an attempt to establish a structure and feel contained and supported in our lives, within the discomfort that we are experiencing.

The point is that as habits become established in the neural highways of our brain, the more we repeat them, the more they will tend to activate in our life in a automatic. Hence the feeling of not controlling what happens to us.

That is why when making a change in habits it is important that we not limit ourselves only to change and that's it, but to develop a new perspective or a different way of relating to the feeding.

Is it common for people to discover that they have a significant problem with this psychological phenomenon? Do they tend to go to therapy to fix it?

Today many people believe that they binge or eat emotionally at all times, due to lack of information adequate, over-information on this subject, or from what they have heard from other people who do not know what they are talking. This generates guilt and negative judgments that goes directly to our self-esteem.

If we look back 15 years, it is the moment in which food became a trend or a fashion. Miracle diets appear, losing weight becomes fashionable and that seems, in my opinion, to neurotize some sectors of our population, totally identifying with those values ​​that they transmit and allowing themselves to be carried away by that current. Becoming obsessed with looking at everything they eat, how this affects their image, measuring what is eat, prohibit food, believe that weight (up to a certain limit) are the only indicators of health... obsessive checks in front of the mirror, importance of the image on how people are, etc.

Yes, there are more and more people who, when they observe or feel some discomfort with their relationship with their diet, take the step and go for a consultation. There are people who realize it beforehand and get down to work to see what happens and others do it by reaching some limit of suffering and that is when they already seek help. In addition, to this day, with the psychonutrition work between psychologist and nutritionist, all this type of food processes and TCA can be approached from a broader and multidisciplinary perspective.

Are there marketing strategies that favor the generalization of emotional eating?

Yes, marketing, advertising and the food industry have it well studied. First of all, we must separate food advertising towards young children and adults.

Children are human beings with a greater degree of vulnerability than adults, and if we look at the strategies that uses food marketing, we will be able to unravel its influence on our relationship with the feeding. Very bright colors, large and striking letters, close and funny dolls, striking packaging, we even see some social idol, athlete or figure of reference for the little ones promoting it too, despite the fact that we know that he would not eat it even far.

On the part of the adults, the audience is appealed through different arguments, from that it is healthier because it is reduced in the percentage of fat or has 0 added sugars (that, to understand us, means that it does not have more sugar than the food itself has, not that it does not have sugar), slogans such as "adult pleasure", "now with more chocolate/cream", "ask for your extra for 1 euro more", "uncover happiness", indications such as "whole wheat 100%" (and then we look at the ingredients and put 20% wholemeal flour), 2x1 offers or ridiculous prices on food with nutrients and calories empty.

All this added to the food trends and fashions that we talked about before, gives rise to an obesogenic environment that favors this type of behavior.

From your point of view as a professional, how do you intervene in therapy to help patients who suffer from emotional eating?

As we have been seeing, eating is a complex process, which is related to emotions, pleasure, rewards, the avoidance of discomfort, the social, the physiological, and it goes beyond the simple fact of taking food to the mouth. The first thing of all would be to carry out an evaluation of the person's life and her relationship with her diet, in order to put it in context and have a starting point.

Generally, many people come with a great load of guilt to the consultation, so it is essential to contextualize and work with them, so that they see that these behaviors are forms, ways or attempts to manage a situation that no longer serve them, and they prefer to choose another more effective way of be managed.

Once we know what situation we are in, it will be important to work and explore different aspects that may be influencing this. process: management of thoughts, emotional management, perception of our image, management of the environment and the obesogenic environment, the stimuli that can favor or activate that behavior, the relationship with food, the learning of that person, strategies, etc.

Each person is different, so it will be essential to work specifically on what that person brings to the consultation; We should not generalize when working with people, since each one has a very different reality.