Many people turn to food as a means of coping with stress. However, repeated use of this coping strategy may create a habit that negatively affects health. Research focused on the biological mechanisms behind stress eating has shown that stress increases amounts of the hormone cortisol in the body, which can stimulate appetite and encourage increased food intake. Eating appetizing food, in turn, stimulates the release of dopamine, one of the brain’s feel good hormones. Repeated activation of this reward pathway can create changes in the brain that make stress eating a habit that can be difficult to avoid. This can lead to weight gain and negative health consequences.
Since stress eating triggers relief through stimulating the brain’s reward pathways, this research used two studies to look at whether other natural rewards processed in the same parts of the brain might reduce stress eating as a coping mechanism. Intimate social interactions that include feelings of closeness and connection with others is one such reward. Having emotionally supportive and caring relationships may make it easier to deal with stress, which may reduce stress eating as a response and prevent weight gain.
STUDY 1
In the first study, researchers used MIDUS data to look at stress eating, emotional support, and weight gain in a large, nationally representative sample of over 1200 people. These factors were assessed:
- Stress eating tendency: was measured by asking participants how much they responded to stressful events in their lives by eating more than they usually do, or by eating more of their favorite foods to make themselves feel better.
- Daily emotional support: participants reported whether they received any emotional support each day over an 8-day period.
- Body weight changes: BMI (body mass index measured by weight and height), as well as waist to hip ratio, was measured at the beginning of the study and about 10 years later.
Results showed that:
- those who had a tendency to stress eat showed increased BMI and waist to hip ratio 10 years later
- but not among those who received more emotional support in daily life.
STUDY 2
Because “emotional support” as assessed in study 1 is such a broad topic, researchers used a smaller sample in the second study to look more closely at a specific type of emotional support, known as social responsiveness, which is the extent of understanding, caring, and validation a person feels from others. They also looked at whether severity of stressors played a role in the relationships between emotional support and stress eating.
Data was from over 500 participants who were part of a year-long COVID study, during which daily data was collected at four time points totaling 24 days. These factors were analyzed, along with BMI:
- Daily social responsiveness: Participants indicated how much daily responsiveness they perceived from others by how much they agreed with two statements: “Today, I felt people were responsive to my needs” and “Today, I felt people valued, understood, and cared about me.”
- Daily stress intensity: Participants were asked to think of the most stressful event that day and indicate how stressful that situation was for them at its peak.
- Daily stress-eating: Participants indicated how they dealt with stressful situations that day including, “to feel better, I ate more than usual or ate foods I don’t usually let myself eat.”
- Overall stress-eating tendency: was assessed with responses to the question, “Do you tend to eat more or less when you feel stressed?”
Results showed that:
- Those who reported having a tendency to stress eat were less likely to stress eat on days when they thought people were more responsive to their needs (they felt more valued and cared for).
- This reduction in stress eating was not associated with days that participants reported having less severe stressors. This suggests that emotional support does not reduce stress eating by making stressors seem less severe.
- No significant difference was found in BMI between stress eaters and non-stress eaters over the year of the second study, regardless of how much social responsiveness they perceived in their daily lives. This may be because a 1-year follow up is not a long enough time to see the weight differences that can be caused by habitual stress eating.
Learning to eat as a means of coping with stressful emotions can lead to weight gain and negative health consequences. Previous research has focused on testing the effectiveness of costly and lengthy interventions, such as courses in mindfulness-based stress reduction, to break the stress eating cycle and reduce obesity. This research suggests that daily environmental factors such as emotional support may also help prevent stress eating. Improving social relationships or increasing interactions with caring friends or family members who provide emotional support may be a more easily accessible and cost effective treatment to offset the negative health consequences that can result from learning to eat in response to stress. More work is needed to test the generalizability of these results, given the high amounts of stress, stress-eating, and obesity in America.
Source: Park, Y., Don, B. P., Mason, A. E., Prather, A. A., & Epel, E. S. (2025). Daily social resources as a buffer against stress eating and its consequences. Health Psychology, 44(2), 108–118. https://doi.org/10.1037/hea0001389
Read the full article at: http://www.midus.wisc.edu/findings/pdfs/2927.pdf