Effects of Implementation Intentions on Eating Disordered Patients and the Role of Self-Efficacy
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2020-07-04
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en
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Implementation Intentions (IIs), also known as ‘If-then-plans’, are shown to be effective in achieving goals regarding eating healthy and dieting. IIs could be a welcome addition to the current treatment of Bulimia Nervosa (BN) and Binge Eating Disorder (BED), since IIs increase the likelihood of achieving goals due to the creation of a strong mental link between a particular situation and the goal-directed response. This study investigated the effect of three IIs sessions on the number of eating binges in patients with BN and BED. Secondary, the moderating effect of self-efficacy was investigated. Thirty-nine participants were divided into two groups and filled out a questionnaire about self-efficacy and kept a food diary for 28 days. Each participant received three treatment sessions. During these sessions, the control group formed only general goals regarding preventing eating binges, whilst the experimental group formed both general goals and IIs. Results showed a marginally significant effect of the IIs treatment on the number of eating binges, which indicates a trend. The power of the current research was too small to produce decisive results. In addition, results showed no significant moderating effect of self-efficacy on the relation between IIs and the number of eating binges. Since there is an ongoing discussion about self-efficacy, this may be partly due to the way the construct of self-efficacy has been interpreted. Further research should increase the power and take a pre and post measurement of a domain-specific self-efficacy questionnaire.
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Faculteit der Sociale Wetenschappen