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© 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.

Abstract

This cross-sectional study aims to investigate the impact of psychological distress experienced during the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic on emotional eating and to assess the mediating role of emotional dysregulation in a sample of Italian young adults (20–35). A total of 437 participants provided demographical data and were assessed using the Depression Anxiety Stress Scale, the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale, and the Emotional Eating subscale of the Dutch Eating Behavior Questionnaire. Correlational analyses were performed to assess the relationship between continuous variables, while ANOVA was conducted to detect differences between males and females for emotional eating. To assess whether demographic and clinical data predicted emotional eating, hierarchical linear regression was performed. Then, a mediation analysis was conducted to assess whether emotional dysregulation was a mediator between psychological distress and emotional eating. Emotional eating was associated with psychological distress and emotional dysregulation. Moreover, higher levels of emotional eating were found in females than in males. Predictors of emotional eating were sex, psychological distress, and emotional dysregulation. Mediation analyses showed that the indirect effect of psychological distress on emotional eating through emotional dysregulation was significant (b = 0.0069; SE = 0.0024; CI = 0.0024–0.0118), confirming that the relationship between psychological distress and emotional eating was mediated by emotional dysregulation, controlling for sex. The model explained 26.8% (R2 = 0.2680) of the variance. These findings may help to plan and develop psychological interventions aimed at addressing emotional eating in young adults by targeting emotional dysregulation.

Details

Title
The Relationship between Psychological Distress during the Second Wave Lockdown of COVID-19 and Emotional Eating in Italian Young Adults: The Mediating Role of Emotional Dysregulation
Author
Anna Guerrini Usubini 1 ; Cattivelli, Roberto 1 ; Varallo, Giorgia 1 ; Castelnuovo, Gianluca 1 ; Molinari, Enrico 1 ; Giusti, Emanuele Maria 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Pietrabissa, Giada 1 ; Manari, Tommaso 2 ; Filosa, Maria 3 ; Franceschini, Christian 3   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Musetti, Alessandro 2   VIAFID ORCID Logo 

 Istituto Auxologico Italiano IRCCS, Psychology Research Laboratory, 20145 Milan, Italy; [email protected] (A.G.U.); [email protected] (R.C.); [email protected] (G.V.); [email protected] (G.C.); [email protected] (E.M.); [email protected] (G.P.); Department of Psychology, Catholic University of Milan, 20123 Milan, Italy 
 Department of Humanities, Social Sciences and Cultural Industries, University of Parma, 43121 Parma, Italy; [email protected] (T.M.); [email protected] (A.M.) 
 Department of Medicine and Surgery, University of Parma, 43121 Parma, Italy; [email protected] (M.F.); [email protected] (C.F.) 
First page
569
Publication year
2021
Publication date
2021
Publisher
MDPI AG
e-ISSN
20754426
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
2544883147
Copyright
© 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.