Publications by authors named "Julia K Smeal"
Article Synopsis
- A study found that highly processed foods might cause withdrawal symptoms similar to drug addiction, and developed a questionnaire to measure these symptoms.
- The Highly Processed Food Withdrawal Scale (ProWS) was tested on 231 participants who had tried reducing processed food intake, showing that withdrawal symptoms peaked around days 2-5 of cutting down.
- The ProWS validated its effectiveness by correlating with addictive eating behaviors, BMI, and weight cycling, suggesting it could be a valuable tool for studying food withdrawal in future research.
Objectives: The current study investigates which foods may be most implicated in addictive-like eating by examining how nutritionally diverse foods relate to loss of control consumption and various subjective effect reports. Subjective effect reports assess the abuse liabilities of substances and may similarly provide insight into which foods may be reinforcing in a manner that triggers an addictive-like response for some individuals.
Design: Cross-sectional.