Braet, Caroline

Evers, Catharine

Goldschmidt, Andrea Beth

Goossens, Lien

Verbeken, Sandra

English

Verbeken, S.

Goldschmidt, A.B.

Evers, C.A.J.M.

Braet, C.

Goossens, L.

Leerstoel Ridder

Stress and self-regulation

NARCIS 

Editorial: Eating Behavior Research in Children's and Adolescent's Naturalistic Environment

Utrecht University Repository

Ghent University Academic Bibliography

EDITORIALpublished: 19 September 2019doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02139Frontiers in Psychology | www.frontiersin.org 1 September 2019 | Volume 10 | Article 2139Edited by:Alix Timko,University of Pennsylvania,United StatesReviewed by:Eleanor Benner,Center for Integrated BehavioralHealth, United States*Correspondence:Sandra Verbekensandra.verbeken@UGent.beSpecialty section:This article was submitted toEating Behavior,a section of the journalFrontiers in PsychologyReceived: 16 July 2019Accepted: 04 September 2019Published: 19 September 2019Citation:Verbeken S, Goldschmidt AB,Evers C, Braet C and Goossens L(2019) Editorial: Eating BehaviorResearch in Children’s andAdolescent’s Naturalistic Environment.Front. Psychol. 10:2139.doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02139Editorial: Eating Behavior Researchin Children’s and Adolescent’sNaturalistic EnvironmentSandra Verbeken 1*, Andrea Beth Goldschmidt 2, Catharine Evers 3, Caroline Braet 1 andLien Goossens 11Department of Developmental, Personality, and Social Psychology, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium, 2Department ofPsychiatry and Human Behavior, Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, The Miriam Hospital, Providence, RI,United States, 3 Psychology Department, Utrecht University, Utrecht, NetherlandsKeywords: eating behavior, children, adolescents, EMA, overeating, foodrefusalEditorial on the Research TopicEating Behavior Research in Children’s and Adolescent’s Naturalistic EnvironmentPURPOSE OF THE RESEARCH TOPICChildren and adolescents’ eating behavior is determined by many intra and extra personal factors,including individual differences in feelings of hunger and satiety, responsiveness to food, foodchoices and preferences, mood state, and environment/context. Advances in technology andinnovations in research methodology have facilitated our understanding of how, why, and underwhat conditions such factors influence eating behavior in youth. The aim of this Research Topicwas to compile research reports executed by experts in eating behaviors that employed naturalisticapproaches. More specifically, the objective was to present results of high quality studies focusingon critical research questions, using complicated designs, and describing impactful findings thatmay have substantial implications for future research. This collection of papers allows reflection onimportant challenges researchers face with when studying eating behavior in children.After reading this Research Topic, we hope readers will have a deeper understanding of andappreciation for how contemporary researchers use daily assessment methodologies for studyingeating- and weight-related constructs in both children and adults, how modern technology can beexploited for this purpose, and the importance of studying these topics in naturalistic contexts.The compiled articles also highlight opportunities to assess antecedents as well as consequencesof eating- and weight-related constructs at multiple time points, and to study community-basedsamples of youth, as well as clinical samples characterized by overeating or food refusal.OVERVIEW OF CONTRIBUTIONSThree contributions of this topic focus on original research in community-based samples. Thepaper by Verschueren et al. examined the temporal sequence of eating disorder symptomatologyand identity formation in a sample of high school students. In this paper, the naturalistic approachis reflected in the longitudinal design comprising three annual measurement waves, which alloweddemonstration of the developmental interplay between adolescents’ identity formation and thedevelopment of eating disorder symptoms. Also prospective in nature, the paper by Debeufet al. used a daily diary design in adolescents to investigate the relationship between stressand eating behavior and the moderating roles of emotion regulation and emotional eating.Findings confirm the association between daily stress and youngster’s eating behavior. Theresults regarding the moderating role of maladaptive emotion regulation and emotional eatingdid not reach significance. A third study including a community-based sample, by Ha et al.,Verbeken et al. Editorial: Research in Youngsters Naturalistic Environmentpresents results from a pilot study exploring the influenceof a food advertising literacy training on food choices in 8to 13-year-old children. The training comprised four sessionsof food advertising literacy training in 1 week, two of themheld in the lab and two of them held at home reflecting thenaturalistic element of this design. Interestingly, findings showeda reduction in the influence of taste attributes in the food decisionmaking process of children after training. Taken together, thesecontributions used naturalistic designs to demonstrate thatintra-personal factors such as identity formation and stressmay explain youngsters’ (pathological) eating behavior and thattraining children to cope with extra-personal factors such as foodadvertising may impact their food choices.Other contributions of this topic focus on research inclinical samples. The paper by Lucarelli et al. describes thedevelopmental course of infantile anorexia, a disorder that isrecently defined as one of the subtypes of Avoidant-RestrictiveFood Intake Disorder. The naturalistic approach of this paperis reflected by the four measurement points at which childrenand their mothers were assessed over time, more specifically,when children were ages 2, 5, 7, and 11 years. Althoughchildren’s malnutrition somewhat improved over time, resultsdemonstrated that a substantial proportion of the children (aswell as their mothers) were still at a high risk of malnutritionand elevated psychopathological symptoms. Moreover, maternalfactors appeared to be the best predictor of emotional/behavioralproblems in the group of children who suffered from persistentmalnutrition. The importance of considering a transactionalview (i.e., including parental factors) when studying eating- andweight-related behavior in children is also an important theme inthe commentary paper by Larsen et al. These authors elaborateon how general parenting styles may moderate the relationbetween weight-related parenting practices, and behaviors andweight outcomes among children. This commentary underscoresthe need for more research in the eating disorders and obesityfields that uses ecological momentary assessment. Finally, in thepaper by Legenbauer et al., a clinical sample of females withbulimia nervosa, binge eating disorder, and controls withouteating disorders were recruited. Using an ecological momentaryassessment design, evidence was found for a relationship betweendysfunctional eating related cognitions and binge eating disorderand bulimia nervosa thereby providing support for cognitivemodels on eating disorders. This study’s use of innovativetechnology may guide similar research in youngsters. In sum,using naturalistic designs, these papers cumulatively demonstratehow intra-personal factors such as dysfunctional eating relatedcognitions and extra-personal factors like parenting styles,practices, and parental psychopathology may be implicated inclinical feeding, eating and weight pathology.RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FUTURERESEARCHThe Importance of Studying EatingBehavior From a Transactional PerspectiveThe results of the included studies demonstrate that it isimportant to incorporate a transactional viewpoint whenstudying child and adolescent eating behavior. Although previousresearch in this area has already focused on examining therole of biological, psychological, and sociocultural factors inimproving our understanding of eating behavior, most studiesfocus on one only of these levels in isolation from the others.However, Lucarelli et al. stress the importance of evaluatingmaternal psychopathogological symptoms which may contributeto the onset, severity, and persistence of children’s disorderedeating over time. Moreover, as Larsen et al. argue, more generalparenting practices should be taken into account as an importantmoderator in the link between feeding practices and eating andweight related outcomes in children. Thus, future research mayinclude a comprehensive approach in which factors that can besituated on different levels are examined together.The Importance of Taking Into AccountDevelopmental TasksNext, when studying eating behavior in children and adolescents,it seems crucial to acknowledge the developmental tasks youthare facing, as well as the complex dynamic relation betweendevelopment and eating problems. For example, as demonstratedby Lucarelli et al., problematic eating behavior that occurs at veryyoung ages influences many aspects of children’s development,such as emotional and behavioral functioning. These authorssuggest that it is important in future research to measure theeffects of malnutrition on the onset of puberty. Thus, it willbe important to investigate not only how stress related todevelopmental tasks may influence eating behavior, but alsothe inverse of how eating behavior may influence development.This point is also underscored by Verschueren et al., whoreported a bidirectional relation between problems with identityformation, an important developmental task during adolescence,and pathological eating behavior in adolescents.Additional Insights From Real TimeApproachesAlthough from a developmental psychopathology perspective,longitudinal studies opportunities to tease apart timing andtemporal sequencing of risk factors for (maladaptive) eatingbehaviors, the use of real-time approaches may offer additionalinsights into momentary predictors or correlates of eatingbehavior in children and adolescents. In the study of Debeufet al., a daily diary design showed that daily stress is associatedwith trajectories of eating motives over 7 consecutive daysof assessment. This adds to our understanding of momentaryassociations between stress and eating behavior as fine-grained analysis are often lacking so far. In the study byLegenbauer et al., an EMA-approach with a signal-samplingand event-sampling design over a period of 48 h was ableto demonstrate how cognitive content exerts an impact oneating behavior in daily life. Although future research shouldexamine whether the findings in adults can be generalizedto younger age groups, this study was the first to showthe impact of specific patterns of dysfunctional eating-relatedcognitions for different ED diagnostic categories using anEMA design. Moreover, as evidence from longitudinal studiesand ecological momentary assessment designs increase ourunderstanding about how affect, cognition, and behavior interactFrontiers in Psychology | www.frontiersin.org 2 September 2019 | Volume 10 | Article 2139Verbeken et al. Editorial: Research in Youngsters Naturalistic Environmentand unfold over time, new and emerging theoretical modelscan be developed to inform interventions, including thosedelivered in real time. For example, Ha et al. targeted asociocultural variable (food advertising) and delivered trainingin both a controlled laboratory environment and in the children’snaturalistic environment. With their training, they were able toinfluence food choice behavior in children between 9 and 13years old.CONCLUSIONWe conclude that the papers of this Research Topic focuson research questions that advance the field and guidefuture research on which (combination of) factors maybe studied to enhance insight in children and adolescent’snormal and pathological eating behavior. Furthermore, thechallenging research designs that are used throughout thedifferent papers offer insight on how innovative researchquestions may be studied in children’s and adolescents’everyday environment.AUTHOR CONTRIBUTIONSSV and LG: contribution to manuscript review and responsiblefor writing the first draft of the current editorial. AG, CE, andCB: manuscript review.Conflict of Interest Statement: The authors declare that the research wasconducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that couldbe construed as a potential conflict of interest.Copyright © 2019 Verbeken, Goldschmidt, Evers, Braet and Goossens. This is anopen-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons AttributionLicense (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted,provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that theoriginal publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academicpractice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not complywith these terms.Frontiers in Psychology | www.frontiersin.org 3 September 2019 | Volume 10 | Article 2139