Self-control training supplementing inpatient multidisciplinary obesity treatment in children and adolescents

Tiffany Naets; Eline Vermeiren; Leentje Vervoort; Annelies Van Eyck; Marijke Ysebaert; Stijn Verhulst; Benedicte De Winter; Kim Van Hoorenbeeck; Luc Bruyndonckx; Ann Tanghe; Ann De Guchtenaere; Sandra Verbeken; Caroline Braet

doi:10.1016/j.brat.2023.104335

Self-control training supplementing inpatient multidisciplinary obesity treatment in children and adolescents

Behav Res Ther. 2023 Aug:167:104335. doi: 10.1016/j.brat.2023.104335. Epub 2023 Jun 5.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Developmental, Personality and Social Psychology, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium. Electronic address: Tiffany.Naets@UGent.be.
² Lab of Experimental Medicine and Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium.
³ Department of Developmental, Personality and Social Psychology, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium; Department of Developmental Psychology, Radboud University, Nijmegen, the Netherlands.
⁴ Lab of Experimental Medicine and Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium; Antwerp University Hospital, Antwerp, Belgium.
⁵ GZA Hospitals and Health Care, Antwerp, Belgium.
⁶ Zeepreventorium, vzw, De Haan, Belgium.
⁷ Department of Pediatrics, AZ Damiaan, Oostend, Belgium.
⁸ Department of Developmental, Personality and Social Psychology, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.

PMID: 37327533
DOI: 10.1016/j.brat.2023.104335

Abstract

Research points to self-control as a possible mechanism for facilitating health behaviour and weight loss. The dual pathway model underpins the role of strong bottom-up reactivity towards food and weak top-down executive functions in obesity. Despite flourishing lab studies on attention bias modification or inhibition trainings, relatively few focused on training both processes to improve self-control in children and adolescents in inpatient multidisciplinary obesity treatment (MOT). Being part of the WELCOME project, this study investigated the effectiveness of Brain Fitness training (using the Dot Probe and Go/No-Go) as an adjunct to inpatient MOT in 131 Belgian children and adolescents. Changes in self-control (performance-based inhibitory control and attention bias as well as self-reported eating behaviour) in the experimental group were compared to sham training. Multiple Imputation was used to handle missing data. Inhibitory control and external eating improved over time (pre/post/follow-up), but we found no evidence for a significant interaction between time and condition. Future research should pay more attention to the role of individual variability in baseline self-control, sham training, and ecological validity of self-control training to improve real-life health behaviour and treatment perspectives for children and adolescents with weight problems.

Keywords: Attention bias; Executive functions; Inpatient treatment; Intervention study; Obesity; Paediatric obesity; Self-control.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Adolescent
Child
Executive Function
Humans
Inpatients*
Obesity
Self-Control*
Weight Loss