Dieting, mindfulness and mindful eating: exploring whether or not diets reinforce mindfulness and mindful eating practices

Abstract

Research into dieting and mindfulness has primarily focused upon how mindfulness and mindful eating affect dieting. However, the effect is bi-directional, with the process of dieting also impacting on mind-set and eating. We, therefore, aimed to investigate how people on different diets experience mindfulness and mindful eating. The present research aimed to explore whether or not specific weight loss diets are likely to prompt more of the elements described in mindfulness and mindful eating theory. participants and procedure A community sample (N = 312) who were dieting at the time of recruitment were asked to fill in mindfulness and mindful eating measures, where commercial weight loss programmes (CWLP), low carbohydrate (LC), and intermittent fasting (IF) were used as dieting methods, as well as general healthy eating (GHE). Analyses of variance were conducted with the intention of comparing those groups in mindfulness and mindful eating, as well as their corresponding sub-constructs. The questionnaires and demographic information were provided through an online database, as well as other information relating to the diet, duration and history of dieting. results The results showed intermittent fasting dieters to score higher across mindfulness and mindful eating scores, although the differences from the rest of the groups were not significant. Investigating mindful eating further through the subscales revealed that CWLP scores were significantly higher in 'routine' when compared to GHE. Trait mindful-ness subscales displayed no significant differences, except 'describe', which was higher in CWLP over LC dieting. conclusions Specific emphasis is given to future directions, and the potential to identify diets that are theoretically and practically consistent with the theory and practices of mindfulness and mindful eating.

Full text

health psychology report · 9
original article
background
Research into dieting and mindfulness has primarily fo-
cused upon how mindfulness and mindful eating aect
dieting. However, the eect is bi-directional, with the
process of dieting also impacting on mind-set and eating.
We therefore aimed to investigate how people on dier-
ent diets experience mindfulness and mindful eating. The
present research aimed to explore whether or not specific
weight loss diets are likely to prompt more of the elements
described in mindfulness and mindful eating theory.
participants and procedure
A community sample (N= 312) who were dieting at the
time of recruitment were asked to fill in mindfulness and
mindful eating measures, where commercial weight loss
programmes (CWLP), low carbohydrate (LC), and inter-
mient fasting (IF) were used as dieting methods, as well
as general healthy eating (GHE). Analyses of variance were
conducted with the intention of comparing those groups
in mindfulness and mindful eating, as well as their cor-
responding sub-constructs. The questionnaires and de-
mographic information were provided through an online
database, as well as other information relating to the diet,
duration and history of dieting.
results
The results showed intermient fasting dieters to score
higher across mindfulness and mindful eating scores, al-
though the dierences from the rest of the groups were not
significant. Investigating mindful eating further through
the subscales revealed that CWLP scores were significantly
higher in ‘routine’ when compared to GHE. Trait mindful-
ness subscales displayed no significant dierences, except
‘describe’, which was higher in CWLP over LC dieting.
conclusions
Specific emphasis is given to future directions, and the po-
tential to identify diets that are theoretically and practi-
cally consistent with the theory and practices of mindful-
ness and mindful eating.
key words
mindfulness; mindful eating; dieting; obesity; intermient
fasting
Rajkieren Singh Manku
B,C,D,E,F
Helen Egan id
E
Rebecca Keyte
E
Misba Hussain
E
Michail Mantzios id
A,B,C,D,E,F
Dieting, mindfulness and mindful eating:
exploring whether or not diets reinforce
mindfulness and mindful eating practices
 – Birmingham City University, Birmingham, United Kingdom
’  – A: Study design · B: Data collection · C: Statistical analysis · D: Data interpretation ·
E: Manuscript preparation · F: Literature search · G: Funds collection
  – Michail Mantzios, Ph.D., Birmingham City University, The Curzon Building Room C307,
B4 7BD Birmingham, United Kingdom, e-mail: michael.mantzios@bcu.ac.uk
    – Manku, R. S., Egan, H., Keyte, R., Hussain, M., &Mantzios, M. (2019). Dieting, mindfulness and
mindful eating: exploring whether diets reinforce mindfulness and mindful eating practices. Health Psychology Report.
hps://doi.org/10.5114/hpr.2019.88057
 09.07.2019 ·  12.08.2019 ·  15.08.2019 ·  18.09.2019

Rajkieren
Singh Manku,
Helen Egan,
Rebecca Keyte,
Misba Hussain,
Michail Mantzios
2  
Background
A growing concern in health research is the rising
gures of obesity (World Health Organisation, 2000).
e health problems associated with obesity are also
increasingly problematic (such as diabetes and car-
diovascular disease), and have led many research-
ers to aempt to combine dieting with mindfulness
for greater eectiveness. Dieting used to aid weight
loss, is normative and shows that even people who do
not need to diet are dieting (Foxcro, 2012; Germov
& Williams, 1996). e range of commercial advice
available extends from trademark dietary plans and
food to diets that do not have any empirical support.
is plethora of diets alter the way people engage
with their food and the way that they eat. Notably, the
lack of eective behavioural interventions means that
there is aconstant reuptake of the diet that previously
worked for aperiod of time, and acontinued cycle of
dieting and non-dieting which does lile to help ad-
dress the issue of obesity.
is impasse has further led to research utilising
mindfulness training to aid individuals in regulating
their weight through amore community health based
approach, where everyone can achieve beer health
outcomes through beer eating behaviours (Lillis,
Hayes, Bunting, &Masuda, 2009; Dalen et al., 2010;
Mantzios &Giannou, 2014; Mantzios &Wilson, 2014a;
Mantzios & Wilson, 2015a). Initial results have been
positive, but anumber of questions regarding the pair-
ing of mindfulness and dieting remain.
Overall, while the theoretical descriptions of mind-
fulness promote a non-judgmental aitude, mindful
aention of eating and of the food consumed, and
responding to internal cues such as hunger and sati-
ety, the enactments of many diets promote opposing
messages to dieters, advocating ignoring such cues,
and promoting judgmental aitudes towards eating.
is research proposes that certain types of diets may
reect more basic characteristics of mindfulness and
mindful eating in comparison to other diets and sets
out to explore whether some diets are more likely
than others to promote increased levels of mindful-
ness and mindful eating in people who are currently
aempting to lose weight.
Mindfulness is amethod of purposely paying at-
tention to the present moment without judgment
(Kabat-Zinn, 1990), and many researchers and clini-
cians have proposed that mindful eating (i.e., mindful-
ness foundations applied to eating) may be amethod
of regulating eating (e.g., Kristeller &Wolever, 2010).
Mindful eating is dened as the act of responding to
physiological cues such as hunger, taste, and fullness,
while maintaining non-judgmental aention through-
out the duration of eating. Examples include making
specic food choices that are aligned to sensory expe-
riences and being aware of internal cues to eat such as
hunger and satiety, rather than elements in the envi-
ronment that predispose people to eat out of habit or
diverted aention (Kristeller &Wolever, 2010). ere
are several studies that outline the positive outcomes
of mindfulness and mindful eating.
Mindful eating assists in the gradual change of prob-
lematic eating paerns that lead to obesity by promot-
ing healthier eating behaviours (Mantzios & Wilson,
2014b; Mantzios &Wilson, 2015a; Mantzios &Giannou,
2014), including adecrease in external and emotional
eating (Warren, Smith, & Ashwell, 2017; O’Reilly,
Cook, Spruijt-Metz, &Black, 2014), an increased in-
take of fruit and vegetables (Du, Keyte, Egan, Hus-
sain, &Mantzios, 2018; Gilbert &Waltz, 2010), as well
as areduction in the consumption of high-sugar and
energy-dense foods (Mason etal., 2016). Research has
found anegative association between mindfulness and
mindful eating and fat and sugar consumption (Man-
tzios, Egan, Hussain, Keyte, &Bahia, 2018), motivation
to eat palatable foods (Mantzios &Egan, 2018), graz-
ing (Mantzios, Egan, Bahia, Hussain, & Keyte, 2018),
and weight gain (Mantzios, Wilson, Linnell, &Morris,
2015). Overall, mindfulness, and more signicantly,
mindful eating, was found to be more eective in im-
proving eating behaviours (see also Mantzios &Wil-
son, 2015b). Research has indicated that the improve-
ment seen in mindful eating interventions may be due
to enhanced self-regulation around food.
Many researchers have aempted to combine
mindfulness and mindful eating principles with diet-
ing to assist people in regulating their weight (Kristell-
er &Wolever, 2010; Tapper etal., 2009). A recent study
by Hendrickson and Rasmussen (2017) found that par-
ticipants who took part in mindful eating were able
to display more control over their food choices. Dalen
etal. (2010) and Lillis etal. (2009) used mindfulness
and mindful eating principles to aid overweight in-
dividuals and found asignicant reduction in weight
and psychological distress. Mantzios and Wilson
(2014b) developed amindful diary that followed the
principles of mindful eating and showed success in the
loss and maintenance of weight, while Hussein, Egan,
and Mantzios (2017) showed that diaries enhanced lev-
els of mindfulness and self-compassion and lowered
anxiety by simply considering the questions of the di-
ary rather than writing the answers. Overall research
has shown that the mindfulness eating diaries were
eective in reducing weight and in assisting with psy-
chological wellbeing, in line with most research with-
in the literature. e focus of the research to date has
been on whether and how mindfulness may inuence
dieting, rather than the eect of dieting on mindful-
ness and mindful eating, especially when considering
the fundamental dierences that exist between diets.
Dieting is essentially restricting food intake or only
having specic foods to lose weight (Brownell &Ro-
din, 1994). Mintel (2014) found 55% of the UK popula-
tion tries to diet each year, and the three most popu-
lar diets that have been identied are explored next

Dieting reinforcing
mindfulness and
mindful eating
3
9
(NHS, 2017). Firstly, there are commercial weight loss
programmes (CWLP) such as Weight Watchers, Slim-
ming World and the Atkins diet. Whilst they all dif-
fer in their way of handling customers, the underlying
principle and benet of CWLP is that of group support
(NHS, 2016; Stinson, 2001). CWLP have proved to be
eective in reducing weight over time (Ahern, Olson,
Aston, &Jebb, 2011; Dixon, Shcherba, &Kipping, 2012)
for example, Heshka etal. (2003) conducted alongitu-
dinal study where they compared CWLP to self-help
and found CWLP to be signicantly more eective
than self-help strategies. However, Tsai and Wadden
(2005) conducted areview and concluded that, with the
exception of Weight Watchers, the benets for CWLP
are less clear. e Atkins diet uses the dietary concept
of ketosis, where the lowering of carbohydrates forces
the body to convert stored fat into energy (NHS, 2016),
and is the second most popular method of dieting.
Low carbohydrate (LC) diets are enacted by con-
suming fewer carbohydrates and increasing other nu-
trients such as protein or fats (Last &Wilson, 2006).
Studies have shown that individuals are more likely
to follow an LC diet when compared to other diets
with no adverse eects on health (Bravata etal., 2003;
Last & Wilson, 2006). However, this type of diet has
had adverse outcomes such as headaches, constipa-
tion and increase of fat consumption (Yancy, Olsen,
Guyton, Bakst, &Westman, 2004). Overall, LC diets
have been found to increase psychological wellbeing
compared to low fat diets (Yancy et al., 2004). How-
ever, research has focused on the Atkins diet, rather
than self-help commitment to LC dieting. ird, in-
termient fasting (IF) is adietary concept of having
aregular eating paern for the majority of the week,
while for afew days aweek calorie intake is severely
cut to 25% of normal intake (600 calories for men, 500
calories for women), with 18-24-hour days of fasting
(NHS, 2016). Harvie etal. (2011) in astudy looking at
IF with afemale population over six months found it
enabled weight loss in addition to reducing biological
risk factors such as type II diabetes.
Diets are generally followed by individuals want-
ing to lose weight, and may be problematic, especially
when considered in association with mindfulness.
For example, some LC diets are designed only for
short-term use, as adverse clinical side eects such
as increases in cortisol production and psychologi-
cal stress have been observed (Tomiyama etal., 2010).
Additionally, Wadden, Stunkard, and Smoller (1986)
found that over 50% of participants displayed dete-
rioration in mood while dieting, with other research
indicating an association with anxiety and depression
(Bruinsma &Taren, 2000; Peet, 2004; Tanskanen etal.,
2001). Furthermore, individuals who are dieting oen
develop high self-critical perspectives, where failure
to meet dietary expectation and not losing weight are
oen reiterated through high levels of self-depreca-
tion, especially in overweight populations (Schwartz
&Brownell, 2004). In addition, the use of apoints sys-
tem in diets and counting calories means that the focus
is shiing away from the body, eating and food, and
is invested in external cues such as how much food is
worth in points or calories, leading to ignoring internal
cues of satiety and hunger – an element that is also
very evident in IF. Overall, there is agreat deal of re-
search which suggests that dieting leads some people
to negative outcomes in relation to their wellbeing.
By contrast, mindfulness and mindful eating lit-
erature have been found to be supportive of mental
health and wellbeing (e.g., Gu, Strauss, Bond, &Ca-
vanagh, 2015). Mindful eating practices suggest that
the individual should focus on the present moment, by
aending to the colour, texture, smell and taste of the
food through touch, sound, sight, smell and taste (Ka-
bat-Zinn, 2005; Albers, 2003). ese practices change
the nature of relating to internal cues and food, and
have been found to increase levels of pleasure (Hong,
Lishner, &Han, 2014). Also, the fundamental princi-
ple of mindfulness and mindful eating is the notion
of being aentive and aware of the present moment
(or meal), with anon-judgmental aitude, the laer
aspect being the exact opposite of the way in which
most diets function (e.g., you give yourself ahard time
if you fail to resist the chocolate). Some research has
suggested that healthy eating oers a more exible
approach than dieting, which is more consistent with
mindfulness (Alberts, Mulkens, Smeets, &ewissen,
2010). Other research has also shown that people were
much more comfortable with healthy eating, and the
concept of dieting was eschewed (Egan &Mantzios
2018). On the other hand, IF may be aform of return-
ing to a level of increased awareness around food,
which may represent a more ‘natural’ way of being.
When food is limited, there is achance of returning
our senses to the body and the food, in ways of ob-
serving hunger and satiety, appreciating ameal, slow-
ing down to prolong the pleasure, and reinforcing the
ability to regulate food intake in ways that treat food
as amethod of nourishment and wellbeing. In this re-
search, we measured mindfulness and mindful eating
and compared CWLP, LC diets, IF, and healthy eating.
Based on the limited literature that is available, the ex-
ploratory hypotheses included: (a) the GHE group will
display signicantly higher mindfulness scores than
other dieting groups, and (b) the GHE group will dis-
play signicantly higher mindful eating scores than
other dieting groups.
Partici Pants and Procedure
PARTICI PANTS
A sample of 312 individuals residing in the district of
West Midlands of the United Kingdom who were cur-
rently dieting took part in this study. Ninety-seven

Rajkieren
Singh Manku,
Helen Egan,
Rebecca Keyte,
Misba Hussain,
Michail Mantzios
4  
participants were omied due to not fully completing
the questionnaire or being on diets that were too low
in number for inclusion in the analysis. e sample
(N=215) was signicantly made up of 60.93% female
and 38.14% male, with amean age of 36 (SD=13.26).
Using G* Power, and aiming for amedium eect size
at Power=.8, and α =.05 indicated for four groups
atotal of 180 participants. No incentive or compen-
sation was oered for participation. Table 1 displays
the demographics of participants.
INSTRUMENTS
Participant information sheet. Participants were asked
to report their age, gender, height, weight, ethnicity,
and the diet they were currently following. Current
dieting served as the independent variable, while the
questionnaires served as the dependent variables of
this research.
Five Facet Mindfulness estionnaire (FFMQ; Baer,
Smith, Hopkins, Krietemeyer, & Toney, 2006). e
FFMQ is a39-item questionnaire measuring ve main
characteristics of mindfulness. Responses range from
1 (never or rarely true) to 5 (very oen or always true).
Sample items are ‘I nd it dicult to stay focused on
what’s happening in the present moment’ (i.e. acting
with awareness) and ‘usually when I have distressing
thoughts or images I can just notice them without re-
acting’ (i.e. non-reactive), and higher scores indicate
higher levels of mindfulness. e ve measured fac-
ets produced α values as follows: observing (α=.72),
describing (α=.83), acting with awareness (α=.81),
non-judging (α = .83) and non-reactivity (α = .89).
e present study produced an overall Cronbach’s α
of .87 for the overall score.
Mindfulness Eating Scale (MES; Hulbert-Williams,
Nicholls, Joy, &Hulbert-Williams, 2014). e MES is
a28-item scale, and is combined with ve subscales,
with responses ranging from 1 (never) to 4 (usually).
Sample items include ‘I wish I could control my eat-
ing more easily’ (i.e. acceptance) and ‘I notice a-
vours and textures when I’m eating my food’ (i.e.
awareness). Higher scores indicate higher levels of
mindful eating. e ve subscales produced the fol-
lowing α values: acceptance (α = .71), awareness
(α=.75), non-reactivity (α=.67), routine (α=.71),
distractibility (α=.70) and unstructured (α=.63). e
present study produced an overall Cronbach’s α of
.75 for the total score.
PROCEDURE
e questionnaire was completed online and the
study was advertised in tness and professional
elds. ose who wished to take part were asked to
go to the study link, which led them through the par-
ticipant information to the consent form, and aer
agreeing to take part, transferred participants to the
questionnaires. Aer completing the questionnaires,
they were directed to adebrief form. Ethical approval
was granted through the University Research Ethics
Commiee and adhered to the strict guidelines of the
British Psychological Society.
e analyses utilised aone-way ANOVA between
the dierent diets on mindfulness and mindful eating.
results
e diet groups were compared on FFMQ and MES
scale scores to determine dierences in mindfulness
and mindful eating. Descriptive statistics are dis-
played in Table 2 for the FFMQ and MES.
Both scales (FFMQ and MES) showed that IF
consistently displayed higher scores. However,
the ANOVA results suggested that the four diets
were not signicantly dierent for both the FFMQ
scale F(3, 206) = .18, p = .913 and the MES scale
F(3,206)=1.30, p=.276.
Further one-way ANOVAs were conducted ex-
ploring the sub-scales of the trait mindfulness (see
Table 3) and mindful eating scales (see Table 4), in-
dicating some signicant ndings. For trait mindful-
Table 1
Demographics of participants
Demographic variable n%
Gender
Male 82 38.14
Female 131 60.93
Prefer not to say 2 0.93
Ethnicity
White 181 84.19
Dual Heritage 12 5.59
Asian 18 8.37
South American 6 2.79
Black 2 0.93
Unknown 3 1.40
Diet type
General healthy eating 59 27.44
Intermient fasting 47 21.86
Low carbohydrate diet 74 34.42
Commercial weight loss
programme 35 16.28

Dieting reinforcing
mindfulness and
mindful eating
5
9
ness, the LC group (M = 3.46, SD = 1.03) obtained
signicantly lower scores in the ‘observe’ sub-
scale in comparison to the CWLP group (M= 4.07,
SD = 0.69). For mindful eating, the CWLP group
(M=4.07, SD=0.69) obtained signicantly higher
scores in the ‘routine’ subscale in comparison to the
GHE group. e rest of the comparisons were not
signicantly dierent.
Table 2
Descriptive statistics of FFMQ and MES
M SD SE 95% confidence interval
for mean
Lower bound Upper bound
FFMQ General healthy eating 133.73 18.35 2.43 128.86 138.60
IF 135.93 29.22 4.26 127.35 144.51
LC 132.45 28.18 3.34 125.78 139.12
CWLP 133.91 24.31 4.10 125.56 142.26
MES General healthy eating 77.63 12.75 1.69 74.24 81.01
IF 80.68 13.18 1.92 76.81 84.55
LC 78.96 13.62 1.61 75.73 82.18
CWLP 75.22 11.57 1.95 71.24 79.19
IF – intermient fasting, LC – low carbohydrate, CWLP – commercial weight loss programme
Figure 1. Mean FFMQ scores across the four diet
groups.
General
healthy
eating
General
healthy
eating
Intermient
fasting
Intermient
fasting
Low
carbohydrate
Low
carbohydrate
Commercial
weight loss
programme
Commercial
weight loss
programme
137
136
135
134
133
132
131
130
Five-Facet Mindfulness estionnaire Mean
Figure 2. Mean MES scores across the four diet
groups.
82
81
80
79
78
77
76
75
74
73
72
Mindful Eating estionnaire Mean
Table 3
Trait mindfulness subscale analyses of variance across
four dieting groups
df F p
Observe 3, 210 0.32 .812
Describe 3, 210 4.26 .006
Awareness 3, 210 1.05 .370
Non-judge 3, 210 0.32 .815
Non-react 3, 210 1.16 .325
Table 4
Mindful eating subscale analyses of variance across
four dieting groups
df F p
Acceptance 4, 210 1.63 .183
Awareness 4, 210 0.60 .623
Non-reaction 4, 210 2.29 .079
Routine 4, 210 3.23 .023
Distracted Eating 4, 210 1.13 .338
Unstructured Eating 4, 210 1.55 .202

Rajkieren
Singh Manku,
Helen Egan,
Rebecca Keyte,
Misba Hussain,
Michail Mantzios
6  
discussion
e overall aim was to explore popular diets and po-
tential dierences between them in mindfulness and
mindful eating. e results indicated that there are
statistically non-signicant dierences between the
dierent diet types in mindfulness and mindful eat-
ing. Investigating mindfulness and mindful eating
in more depth revealed some signicant dierences.
For mindful eating, the subscale ‘routine’ scores were
signicantly higher for the CWLP group than for the
GHE group. For trait mindfulness, the subscale ‘de-
scribe’ scores were higher for CWLP than for LC diet-
ing. e results do not agree with previous sugges-
tions in the mindfulness and mindful eating literature,
and were not strong enough in indicating statistical
signicance of IF as suggested in the introduction.
e results may be precursors for future research, es-
pecially when we aempt to explain the results.
IF appears to support mindful eating more than
other diets, but in the present research this was
not statistically adequate to expand the discussion
to agreater extent. e results might have reached
statistical signicance with larger sample sizes, but
it may be the case that there are other elements to
explore simultaneously. For example, depriving one-
self of food for several hours may mean that the next
meal is approached impulsively, while impulsiv-
ity itself has been linked to obesity (Mobbs, Crepin,
iery, Golay, &van der Linden, 2010), which may
form another method of relating to food. Future re-
search needs to explore mindfulness and mindful
eating in dierent diets, and specically for IF, by
incorporating an impulsivity scale to control for po-
tential covariance. Another method could be to invite
dierent dieters to participate in experimental re-
search, and explore the potential of diets reinforcing
or priming mindful eating principles. Closely aligned
are the results for CWLP. Although signicant, the
primary question is whether the mindful eating sub-
scale of routine and the trait mindfulness subscale
of describe are elements that satisfactorily describe
mindful eating and mindfulness. Readymade meals
and point systems draw people away from active
decision making and active engagement with food,
which reinforces amindless routine that is consistent
with the results of this study, but is far from mind-
ful eating. ere are certainly dierent perceptions
of dieting food (Sobal &Cassidy, 1987), and further
research needs to be conducted on dieting foods and
the mindful and mindless properties of consuming
those foods. Similarly, the way people have been
taught to diet relates to being judgmental and critical
of one’s choices and can lead to very negative feel-
ings about dieting (Egan & Mantzios, 2018). ere-
fore, there may be some value as to how people relate
to diet foods and palatable foods (Mantzios &Egan,
2018), and potential associations and dierences be-
tween them, which could dene the mindless and
mindful relationships people have with food.
Another aspect that was briey mentioned in the
introduction was the occurrence of focusing on the
future and judgment reinforcing the aim of dieting.
Regardless of the diet, the potential focus on long-
term goals may go against the principles of mindful-
ness and mindful eating, and the overarching aim to
remain present and meal-focused. e diet at times
may be very dierent from usual restrictive eating,
where people exclude carbohydrates, eating ready-
prepared diet meals, focusing on ‘points’, the value of
which may be prominently displayed on the packag-
ing, all of which may change the dynamics of con-
sumption and mindful consumption of food. It is pos-
sible that in an aempt to stick with the diet, people
try not to think about what they are eating (or not
eating), particularly as dieting is perceived as some-
thing that is undesirable and self-defeating (Mantzios
&Egan, 2018; Egan &Mantzios, 2018).
A few limitations need to be considered. As men-
tioned previously, alarger sample could have high-
lighted the dierences between some groups in this
research. Another limitation is the limited information
about dieting behaviours that was acquired from par-
ticipants. Having more detailed information regard-
ing how active current dieting behaviour is, including
ahistory of dieting aempts and dierent diets used, as
well as noting aempts to follow mindful eating prin-
ciples in current and/or past dieting aempts, would
have enabled amore tightly controlled investigation.
Overall, despite the signicant and non-signi-
cant ndings, this research has opened up another
way of exploring research on mindfulness and eat-
ing. For patients in weight management, and for the
general public who are overweight and obese, mixed
messages about mindful eating reduce the possibil-
ity of achieving and maintaining optimal weight. In
terms of applied research and practice, and the ability
to investigate and redevelop diets that are themselves
reinforcing, mindful eating may be anovel form of
priming or nudging that is easy and eortless for
people who are aiming to regulate their weight. As-
similating and developing the best methods that align
with mindfulness and mindful eating principles may
form another method of enhancing the eciency and
acceptability of mindfulness practices in the eld of
obesity and weight regulation.
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