The Relational Assessment Procedure: Investigating the Effects of Hunger Manipulations on Implicit F

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The Relational Assessment Procedure
Investigating the Effects of Hunger Manipulations
on Implicit Food Attitudes Ian McKennaDermot
Barnes-HolmesYvonne Barnes-HolmesIan Stewart
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• Recently, researchers have begun to use implicit
  measures to investigate attitudes towards the
  palatability (liking) of foods in lean and obese
  populations.
• Initial research, using the IAT, indicated that
  obese people had a significantly more negative
  attitude to high fat foods than the lean controls
  (Roefs Jansen, 2002)
• More recent research with children, using the
  EAST, indicated that obese children showed a bias
  towards both healthy and unhealthy food relative
  to controls, suggesting obese children simply
  like eating (Creaynest et al., 2005)
• In 2007, Finlayson used a forced choice
  behavioural measure to assess the impact of
  hunger-state on implicit attitudes towards
  wanting food -- he found that satiation caused
  explicit wanting for savory and sweet category
  foods to decrease. However, implicit wanting
  increased for sweet categories but not savory.

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• The current study is the first to use the IRAP to
  investigate the effects of hunger manipulations
  on implicit food attitudes in non obese
  individuals.
• The idea behind the IRAP is relatively
  straightforward participants are asked to
  respond as fast and accurately as possible across
  trials that are deemed relationally consistent or
  inconsistent with current verbal or relational
  responses.
• In essence, it should be easier for participants
  to respond across consistent compared to
  inconsistent trials (Barnes-Holmes et al., 2006).

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Makes me feel VERY Hungry now
Makes me feel SLIGHTLY Hungry now
Makes me feel SLIGHTLY Hungry
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The IRAP Some Example Tasks
Pro-Unhealthy Tasks
Makes me feel SLIGHTY Hungry now

Makes me feel VERY Hungry now

True False
True False
Makes me feel SLIGHTY Hungry
now
Makes me feel VERY Hungry now

True False
True False
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The IRAP Some Example Tasks
Pro-Healthy Tasks
Makes me feel SLIGHTLY Hungry
now
Makes me feel VERY Hungry
now
True False
True False
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Pro-Healthy Tasks First
Pro-Unhealthy Tasks First
Block 1 Pro-Unhealthy Block 2
Pro-Healthy Block 3 Pro-Unhealthy Block 4
Pro-Healthy Block 5 Pro-Unhealthy Block 6
Pro-Healthy
Block 1 Pro-Healthy Block 2
Pro-Unhealthy Block 3 Pro-Healthy Block 4
Pro-Unhealthy Block 5 Pro-Healthy Block 6
Pro-Unhealthy
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• Participants
• Group 1, Four-Hour-Plus Group,
• Nineteen, 8 females and 11 males (age M 21.8
  years, SD 2.9 BMI M 21.4 Kg/m², SD 1.9.
• Group 2, Two-Hour-Hunger Group,
• Twenty, 11 females and 9 males (age M 19.6
  years, SD 3.6 BMI M 21.3 Kg/m ², SD 2.1.
  
• Group 3, No-Restriction-Control Group,
• Twenty-Two, 10 females and 12 males (age M
  22.7 years, SD 3.1 BMI M 21.7 Kg/m ², SD
  2.5.
• Group 4, Sated Group,
• Eighteen, 8 females and 10 males (age M 20.1
  years, SD 1.1 BMI M 21.8 Kg/m ², SD 2.1

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• Explicit Measures
• The same 12 food items on the IRAP were presented
  on two 9-point Likert scales, one that varied
  from -4 (NOT Hungry) to 4 (VERY Hungry) and
  another that ranged for -4 (Not Palatable) to 4
  (Very Palatable).
• Eating Disorder Examination Questionnaire
  (EDE-Q5 Fairburn Beglin, 1994). No significant
  differences between the groups.
• Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding (BIDR
  Paulhus, 1988). No significant differences
  between the groups.

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Explicit Measures
Overall D-IRAP Score
Overall Wanting
P gt .05
P gt .05
Overall Liking
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• The findings from the current study indicated
  that participants responses on an implicit
  measure of food attitudes changed as a function
  of hunger state.
• Individuals in the Four-Hour-Plus Hunger, and
  Sated group did not discriminate between healthy
  and unhealthy foods, but the No-Restriction-Contro
  l individuals showed a significant bias towards
  unhealthy food while the Two-Hour-Hunger
  individuals demonstrated a significant healthy
  food bias.
• This difference in attitudes was not reflected in
  the explicit measures, and the explicit-implicit
  correlations were absent.
• The IRAP appears to be tapping into responses
  that are not captured by explicit measures.
• The IRAP thus appears capable of measuring
  implicit responses to healthy and unhealthy foods
  along a relatively subtle dimension (very versus
  slightly hungry)
• Moreover, this is the first study to show that
  responses to food items on the IRAP are sensitive
  to hunger state.

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The Implicit Relational Assessment Procedure
Investigating the Effects of Hunger Manipulations
on Implicit Food AttitudesIan McKennaDermot
Barnes-HolmesYvonne Barnes-HolmesIan Stewart