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Disinhibition, as assessed by the Three-Factor Eating Questionnaire, is inversely related to psychological well-being in postmenopausal women

International Journal of Obesity volume 31, pages 315–320 (2007)Cite this article

Abstract

Objective:

The main purpose of this cross-sectional study was to verify the hypothesis of a relationship between weight status and psychological well-being, and to examine whether cognitive dietary restraint, disinhibition, susceptibility to hunger and dieting history could be related to psychological well-being.

Design and subjects:

In a sample of 101 postmenopausal women, we performed anthropometric measurements (weight, height and body mass index (BMI)), and measured psychological well-being (PER Questionnaire). The Three-Factor Eating Questionnaire (TFEQ) and a questionnaire about dieting history (dieters: had already been on a diet; non-dieters: had never been on a diet) were also administrated.

Results:

A trend for a significant relationship was observed between BMI and psychological well-being (r=−0.17; P=0.08). Significant negative relationships were observed for disinhibition, susceptibility to hunger and all their subscales with psychological well-being (−0.28⩽r⩽−0.48), whereas no significant differences in psychological well-being were observed between dieters and non-dieters. Finally, women displaying a higher score for habitual susceptibility to disinhibition (which is the subscale of TFEQ that was the most closely related to psychological well-being) had a lower level of psychological well-being, regardless of their weight status.

Conclusion:

These results show that, as well as being related to weight status, TFEQ-factors are also related to psychological well-being. More specifically, individuals who display higher levels of disinhibition may be at higher risk of having an impaired psychological well-being.

Psychological correlates of obesity remain under controversy. As eating behaviors and dieting history have been previously related to obesity status, these dietary variables may contribute to identify overweight and obese individuals who are at higher risk of having an impaired psychological well-being.

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Acknowledgements

This research project was supported by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (MOP-37957) and Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada. VP is recipient of a studentship from the Fonds de la recherche en santé du Québec; SL is a research scholar from the Fonds de la recherche en santé du Québec. We express our gratitude to the subjects for their excellent collaboration as well as to Réseau Psychotech for having given us the opportunity to publish results from the PER Questionnaire.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Nutraceuticals and Functional Food (INAF) and Department of Food Science and Nutrition, Laval University, Québec, Canada

    V Provencher, M-È Piché, L Corneau & S Lemieux

  2. School of Psychology, Laval University, Québec, Canada

    C Bégin

  3. Lipid Research Center, CHUL, CHUQ, Québec, Canada

    M-È Piché, J Bergeron & S J Weisnagel

  4. Diabetes Research Unit, CHUL, CHUQ, Québec, Canada

    S J Weisnagel & A Nadeau

Authors
  1. V Provencher
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  2. C Bégin
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  3. M-È Piché
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  4. J Bergeron
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  5. L Corneau
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  6. S J Weisnagel
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  8. S Lemieux
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Correspondence to S Lemieux.

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Provencher, V., Bégin, C., Piché, MÈ. et al. Disinhibition, as assessed by the Three-Factor Eating Questionnaire, is inversely related to psychological well-being in postmenopausal women. Int J Obes 31, 315–320 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.ijo.0803405

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