Effects of priming thoughts about control on anxiety and food intake as moderated by dietary restraint

The study was designed to examine: (a) if activating thoughts about control affects anxiety and food intake and (b) if those effects are moderated by dietary restraint. Eighty female undergraduates were administered the Dietary Restraint questionnaire and were primed for cognitions of control or of lack of control. The participants' perceptions of control over food consumption, their state anxiety, and their food intake as part of an alleged taste-test, were assessed. As evidence for the effectiveness of priming, participants reported less control over food consumption after being primed for lack of control than for control cognitions. As expected, Restraint score was negatively correlated with perceived control over food consumption. Consistent with hypothesis, participants high in dietary restraint experienced greater anxiety after being primed for control than after priming for lack of control, whereas participants low in dietary restraint displayed the opposite pattern. These findings were consistent with the cognitive dissonance principle that individuals experience greater anxiety when cognitions are inconsistent with personal beliefs than when they are consistent. As expected, priming thoughts of lack of control resulted in greater food intake than did priming thoughts of control, supporting the hypothesis of a nonconscious, automatic link between cognitions and food intake.