Do kids with weaker self-control show riskier eating habits?
In ordinary schoolchildren, the 'cool' thinking-control skills hung together as one ability, the emotional 'hot' tasks did not, and weaker cool control went with some riskier eating styles only in girls.
Source
Executive function and food approach behavior in middle childhood
Study at a glance
- Design
- Cross-sectional — One-time battery of five executive-function tasks plus parent and child eating questionnaires, analysed with confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation models
- N
- N=1657 · 1657 children (and 1339 parents who filled in eating questionnaires); some parent ratings missing and estimated by full information maximum likelihood
- Population
- Children aged 6-11 from grades 1-3 of 33 elementary schools in Brandenburg, Germany
- Outcome
- Factor structure of hot vs. cool EF tasks; associations of EF with six food-approach eating styles (e.g., food responsiveness, emotional overeating, restrained eating)
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What they did
The researchers tested 1657 German first- to third-graders individually on five executive-function tasks: three 'cool' ones (switching between rules, repeating digits backwards, and a fruit Stroop task) and two 'hot' ones (a child gambling task and a choice between a small treat now or a bigger one a week later). Parents rated their child's eating habits on questionnaire scales, children rated their own restrained eating, and body weight and height were measured. Factor models tested whether the tasks split into hot and cool abilities, and structural equation models linked EF to eating styles separately for girls and boys, controlling for age and fluid intelligence.
What they found
Both a one-factor and a two-factor model fit the data, but the one-factor model was slightly more economical, and the two hot tasks loaded very weakly on any factor and did not covary with each other, so 'hot EF' did not behave like one coherent ability. The three cool tasks formed a solid shared factor, and the structure looked the same in younger and older halves of the sample. In girls, weaker cool EF went with more food responsiveness, more desire to drink and more restrained eating, while better delay of gratification was slightly linked to more emotional overeating; in boys there were no significant links. Only two of the girl-boy differences were statistically significant, and all associations were small to moderate.
The limits
What it doesn't show
The data are cross-sectional, so the study cannot say whether weak EF leads to risky eating or whether diet affects cognition; the authors call for longitudinal work. Hot EF was measured with only two quite different tasks, and the delay task hit a ceiling, so the failure to find a hot factor may reflect the task choice rather than the absence of the ability. Eating styles came mostly from parent ratings and short questionnaire scales, while EF came from child tasks, which the authors note affects how strong the associations can look. The gender pattern was mostly not formally significant, so claims that EF matters only for girls are tentative.
Key terms
- Executive function (EF)
- A set of control processes, such as switching, updating working memory and inhibiting responses, that let people steer their thoughts and actions toward goals.
- Cool vs. hot EF
- Cool EF is control used on abstract, emotionally neutral problems; hot EF is control used when rewards, emotions or motivation are at stake.
- Confirmatory factor analysis
- A statistical method that tests whether a set of measured tasks fits a pre-specified pattern of underlying abilities (factors).
- Delay of gratification
- Choosing to wait for a larger reward instead of taking a smaller one right away.
- Food approach behavior
- Eating styles that push toward eating more, such as constantly asking for food or eating in response to emotions or food cues.
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Quiz yourself
Which pattern best describes the factor results for EF tasks?
Common questions
Does this show that poor self-control causes children to overeat?
No. Everything was measured at one time point, so the direction of the link is unknown, and the associations were small.
Why didn't the two hot tasks go together?
They differ a lot: the gambling task needs you to track wins and losses over many trials, while the delay task involves only a few simple, certain choices, so they may tap different skills that develop at different times.
Why would effects appear in girls but not boys?
The authors speculate that girls in Western cultures face more pressure about weight and so regulate their eating more consciously, but this explanation was not tested.
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