Attentional bias to unhealthy food in individuals with severe obesity and binge eating.

Attentional bias is an implicit cognition relevant to development and maintenance of obesity, but little is known of how binge eating modulates attentional bias in severe obesity. This study investigated attentional bias towards unhealthy foods at different stages of attentional processing in a clinical sample, comparing obese patients (Body Mass Index, BMI>35 kg/m) with and without binge eating behaviors. Participants were separated into two groups according to their score on the Binge Eating Scale (BES): no binge eating (NB; score ≤17; n = 23) and binge eating (BE; score > 17; n = 19).