During the past two years I’ve written several blog posts about emotional eating and its causes.  As I learned more about emotional eating from my clients and about learning theory, I’ve changed my mind on several occasions.  I now think I understand the essential causes of one of the biggest problems we face: One-third of America’s adult population is obese and another one-third is overweight.  The health consequences are devastating; the financial costs are staggering; the misery experienced by those afflicted is overwhelming.  Nothing proposed thus far has come close to being able to stem the epidemic.  I think I have the answer.

Most proposed solutions attempt to deal with the symptoms, namely the weight people gain when they eat emotionally.  These proposed solutions include a wide variety of diets, special eating plans like Jenny Craig, in-patient facilities, exercise programs, pills to kill appetite, pills to change metabolism, 12 step programs, etc.  On his television show last week, Dr. Oz tried to scare obese people into stopping their emotional eating by graphically displaying the medical consequences of their behavior.

The reason these plans for dealing with the obesity epidemic ultimately fail is that all of them ignore the source of the problem: a conditioned, obsessive need to eat in order to deal with negative emotions and to attain specific rewards.

The first type of conditioning: emotional triggers

The primary cause of emotional eating is emotional triggers, usually negative emotions such as anxiety, feeling unlovable, feeling angry, and feeling bored.  At some point in life an emotional eater ate and experienced either comfort, a pleasurable distraction from the negative feeling, and/or a calming sensation.  After that sequences happened a few times, the negative emotion got conditioned to result in an obsessive need to eat because eating relieved the discomfort of the negative feeling.  The negative emotion became an unconscious and automatic trigger for the eating.

Graphically it looks like this:

Negative emotion + accidental eating (results in)> pleasurable distraction x repetition = (results in conditioning) Negative emotion (results in)> an obsessive need to eat

In other words, when a negative feeling is followed by normal eating and that eating produces a pleasurable distraction or a sense of calming, and that sequence happens repeatedly, eating gets transformed from an activity we engage in only when we are hungry, to a compulsion that gets triggered when that negative feeling is experienced, in order to gain the pleasurable distraction.

The second type of conditioning: to gain a reward

There is a second type of conditioning involved in emotional eating.  This occurs when eating is consistently followed by some type of “reward,” resulting in a compulsive need to eat whenever those “rewards” are desired.  Some typical “rewards” include the desire to celebrate, the desire to give oneself pleasure, and wanting to be in control.

In other words, rewards have been conditioned so that desiring them will result in a compulsive need to eat.

Graphically it looks like this:

Eating (results in)> reward x repetition = (results in conditioning) the desire for the reward (results in)> the obsessive need to eat

I created the Lefkoe De-conditioning Process (LDP) specifically to de-condition these two types of conditioning that are responsible for emotional eating.  See http://emotionaleatingreport.com to learn how the LDP works.)

Beliefs are a secondary cause of emotional eating

In most cases of emotional eating beliefs are a secondary cause.  Some typical beliefs that lead to emotional eating include:

  • To lose weight you can’t eat anything “bad.”
  • The way to keep food from running my life (like it did my mom’s) is to eat whatever I want to eat.
  • If I don’t eat when there’s food around there won’t be any later.
  • Eating is a way to not be alone.
  • The best way to avoid sex is to be heavy so men wouldn’t be interested in me.

Although the elimination of some beliefs might be required to totally eliminate someone’s emotional eating, conditioning is the primary cause of the problem.

Other learning theories

There are other theories psychologists could use to explain the “conditioning” or “learning” that I contend causes emotional eating, including Information Processing Theory and Behavioral Theory.  Each theory comes at learning or conditioning in a totally different way than I do.  If either theory has both an explanation for how emotional eating becomes an unconscious, automatic, obsessive behavior that emotional eaters are helpless to overcome on their own and a technique for effectively stopping that behavior, I am not aware of it.

The problems can be overcome

Although the twin problems of obesity and overweight are the result of more factors than emotional eating, if people were not conditioned to eat when they weren’t hungry, they would gain far fewer pounds.  The Lefkoe De-conditioning Process quickly, easily, and permanently de-conditions that conditioning.  Now let’s find a way to make it available to the hundreds of millions of people who need it desperately.

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copyright ©2012 Morty Lefkoe

10 Comments

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  2. Alex November 20, 2013 at 8:39 am - Reply

    Morty,
    I just wanted you to know that while dealing with my own overweight ALL my life I’ve come to the same conclusion about the correlation of emotions to food. I remember food being stuck almost under my nose….”eat…you’ll feel better” was the litany. The “feel better” was momentary at the most. So I’m very interested in this information, and will certainly follow-up.

    I’ve gone to your free site and eliminated the “I’m not important” and the other two videos you offered, and immediately felt a decided difference in how I felt. Not just about my “self” but also about the world around me. I am not so self-conscious as I used to be, and I’ve found myself singing when I’m alone in the car or the house…I love to sing, and I haven’t been happy enough to do it in a very long time. So…thank you, sir, for giving me back a joy and a peaceful-ness.
    Always happy to grow more. I’ve been working on me for a very long time!!
    Life is good!
    Alex

  3. robert September 29, 2012 at 4:56 pm - Reply

    dear morty,
    please can you answer me ?
    what is your intention, dissolving occurring or create a new positive occurring ?
    thank you.
    robert

  4. robert September 28, 2012 at 2:28 am - Reply

    dear morty,
    what is your intention, dissolving occurring or create a positive occurring ?
    thank you.
    robert

  5. Lucio September 26, 2012 at 1:10 pm - Reply

    Finally someone who thinks the same way that I do: That people over eat to fill some emptyness in their lives.

    I’ve always thought that the best way to lose weight (I’ve never been fat though) is to find something in your life that fulfills you more than eating, so that you don’t need to eat to feel good.

    I personally find myself busy in my internet endeavours for most of the day and because I love what I do (researching and taking action) I can spend hours working without feeling hungry, and when it’s time to eat I never over eat.

    I think people should be taught about emotional eating when they’re young (and parents should teach it to their children).

    By the way Morty, your programs are amazing and I think that if enough people use them you can make a big change. Things like these should be taught on school…

  6. Lauren September 26, 2012 at 8:15 am - Reply

    Morty,
    Since I eliminated the basic limiting beliefs and learned how to take care of my occurrings, I’ve also gained a new undersanding of my body. I have hypothyroidism and hit a plateau in losing weight. Also, my back goes out because of structural and accident issues which interferes with digestion. I’ve dealt with these issues by going to a nutritionist and the chiropractor and also paying attention to my own “self-talk” as well as conditionings. I know you don’t advocate any diet, but I’ve discovered that Eating Right For Your Type has helped tremendously. @ carmel: I am in the midst of de-cluttering and it seems that eliminating extra pounds of stuff correlates with eliminating extra pounds of weight; it would be interesting to find out if anyone else has noticed this phenomenon.
    Love and Light to all on the Journey,
    Lauren

  7. carmel September 26, 2012 at 4:01 am - Reply

    Hi Morty,
    Physical clutter in the home is a protective mechanism also. My sister has lost 40lbs over the last 5 years by getting rid of her clutter and doing nothing else. Shopping for pleasure and not need, loses it’s hold when you remember how much stuff you threw out and you don’t want to go through it all again.
    There’s physical clutter, body clutter and mental clutter and they all perform a protective barrier, like you mention above and keep us ‘safe’ from whatever.
    I helped my mother also get rid of stuff and I notice less food in her fridge and she’s lost about 10 lbs, by doing nothing else.
    My younger sister the same thing is happening, so there’s a link here somewhere.
    I pratice Feng Shui and clutter is the main block of energy to our lives, we need to get rid of our physical stuff first, the first layer, it’s a learning process to shed stuff.
    In America we have way to much stuff, big houses full of stuff, plenty of closets to hold our stuff, and huge storage places to hold our other stuff.
    Also food is addictive, the stuff with the salt and sugar, I know my daughter craves the sugary stuff and not carrots. So what they’re adding to the food is also part of the problem
    I see what a lot of kids in our school eat so it’s no wonder they’re getting obese.
    My point is that we need to work on the physical stuff first and then the body and mental stuff becomes clearer.

  8. valentin September 26, 2012 at 1:27 am - Reply

    Very interesting.
    Do you have the approximate long term success rate with your overweight clients?
    Regards,
    Valentin

    • Morty Lefkoe September 26, 2012 at 7:40 am - Reply

      Hi Valentin,

      Almost all of them. Some come back after a while and we discover some beliefs we had missed originally, but most get it handled eventually. And some stop working on the problem before all the beliefs and conditionings have been eliminated. At some point we will have to do a controlled study.

      Love, Morty

  9. Alex September 25, 2012 at 4:56 pm - Reply

    Morty, you’re a hero, seriously. I bet you’re gonna make history.

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