Eating expectancies among trauma-exposed Latinx college students: The role of mindful attention

Abstract

Objective: Emergent research suggests that trauma-exposed Latinx college students are a particularly at-risk group for eating-related problems. For this reason, there is a need to further understand the cognitive processes that may underpin maladaptive eating among this vulnerable segment of the population. Participants: Participants included 304 trauma exposed Latinx college students (84.5% females; M_age = 22.8 years, SD = 5.79). Methods: The current study examined the role of mindful attention in relation to several distinct expectancies related to eating. Results: Results indicated that lower reported levels of mindful attention were associated with greater levels of expectancies of eating to help manage negative affect, expectancies that eating will alleviate boredom, and expectancies that eating will lead to feeling out of control. Conclusions: These findings suggest that it may be beneficial to assess for mindful attention among Latinx college students with a history of trauma exposure presenting with problematic eating behaviors.

Keywords:

• College
• eating expectancies
• Latinx
• mindful attention
• trauma

Conflict of interest disclosure

The authors have no conflicts of interest to report. The authors confirm that the research presented in this article met the ethical guidelines, including adherence to the legal requirements, of the United States of America and received approval from the Institutional Review Board (IRB) of the University of Houston.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, MJZ, upon reasonable request.

Notes

1 The current study utilized the Posttraumatic Diagnostic Scale to describe the most distressing of the traumatic events witnessed/experienced and posttraumatic stress symptom severity based on DSM-IV-TR PTSD Criterion A. However, the trauma exposure eligibility screening question used in the current study (i.e., “Have you ever experienced or witnessed or had to deal with an extremely traumatic event that included actual or threatened death or serious injury or sexual violence to you or someone else?”) was obtained from the MINI, version 7.0 for DSM-5. It is important to note that this screening question from the MINI for DSM-5 did not change from the former versions of the MINI for DSM-IV.

Additional information

Funding

Ms. Kauffman is supported by the pre-doctoral National Research Service Award (F31-DA046127).