Your guide to overcoming emotional eating

A growing body of research has highlighted that the link between your state of mind and what you put on your plate begins in childhood.  “When a child is upset and a parent provides them with food, the child learns to associate that emotional state with eating,” says UK-based researcher Dr Charlotte Hardman. “Provided it’s one of many ways in which a parent helps soothe their child, it’s perfectly healthy.”

Normal development, she explains, would see that child grow up to find alternative coping strategies for dealing with negative emotions, meaning that they don’t always resort to edible comforts when they’ve been, say, cut loose after four dates by a new partner, or passed over for promotion. If, for whatever reason, they don’t develop alternative means of soothing themselves, that’s when their emotional eating becomes unhealthy – and predisposes them to a range of health problems.  The picture gets more complex if the child isn’t securely attached to their parents. Attachment theory essentially divides people into three different types of relationship, or attachment, styles – secure, anxious, avoidant – based on their early relationships with their primary caregiver(s) and how adequately their needs were met.

“Some individuals appear to have developed the ability to regulate their own emotions
with soothing self-talk,” says Dr Hardman. “It’s something they’ve likely picked up from a caregiver they had a secure relationship with – someone who they could approach to talk through this difficult emotion, so they learn how to manage it on their own in future.” But when a child hasn’t had those key lessons? “Our research shows that those who are anxiously, or insecurely, attached are less able to disengage from negative emotions and therefore seek something external, such as food, to help them cope,” she says. While acknowledging that not everyone with an insecure attachment style will comfort eat to a problematic extent, Dr Hardman points to her team’s 2018 study, in which they found that those who reported being anxious about their personal relationships – indicative of having an insecure attachment style – were more likely to comfort eat and, consequently, have a higher body mass index.

Meanwhile, some research has looked at what happens to our food choices when we’re feeling happy. “There’s some research suggesting that when people are elated, like in the throes of romantic love or after a great victory, they eat fewer kilojoules overall and, if given the choice, are more likely to choose fruits and vegetables over foods high in fat and carbs,” says Dr Herz.

These intense emotions aren’t as potent as the ones at the gloomier end of the spectrum, though. “Negative emotions are typically there to keep you alive and get you out of dangerous situations,” she continues. “Because more immediate action is required, they’re more powerful than positive emotions, and it could be that this is true in the context of food, too.”

2. Tuning into mixed emotions