Effects of depressive mood and food cues on food cravings among Japanese: Experimental research

Objective

To examine the effects of depressive mood and cue stimuli on food cravings in online and laboratory experiments, respectively.

Methods

Experiment 1 examined the relationship between depressive mood and food cravings using a depressive mood induction procedure. Participants read the scenario for the condition before responding to questions about whether they had ever had an experience similar to the scenario and if they could easily visualize it. Each participant then completed a modified version of the Food Craving Inventory for Japanese and Profile of Mood States. Experiment 2 examined the impact of eating a first chip (under mild deprivation conditions) on subsequent cravings for chips. Participants were randomly allocated to either a potato chip (n = 22) or sweet potato chip (n = 23) cue group.

Results

In Experiment 1, increases in depressive mood when reading depressive mood-arousing scenarios depended on participants’ ability to recall similar scenarios. In the experimental condition (n = 110), feelings of depressive mood increased; in the control condition (n = 113), depressive mood was not aroused. When depressive mood was caused by a depressive mood-arousing scenario, cravings for Western foods occurred. However, no such association was found for sweet foods. In Experiment 2, the dependent variable was performance on the behavioral task and subjective cravings for potato chips. The potato chip cue induced only subjective cravings.

Conclusions

Experiment 1 showed that when depressive mood was induced by reading a depressive mood-arousing scenario, cravings for Western foods and rice were generated. Experiment 2 showed that eating a small amount of potato chips triggered a larger craving. The two experiments suggested that many types of drugs related to abuse and control mechanisms are associated with cravings for sweet foods; however, future studies should examine whether similar mechanisms control cravings for foods that are low in sugar.