Think fast: rapid assessment of the effects of episodic future thinking on delay discounting in overweight/obese participants

Journal of Behavioral Medicine
Jeffrey S SteinWarren K Bickel

Abstract

Accumulating laboratory-based evidence indicates that reducing delay discounting (devaluation of delayed outcomes) with the use of episodic future thinking (EFT; mental simulation of future events) improves dietary decision-making and other maladaptive behaviors. Recent work has adapted EFT for use in the natural environment to aid in dietary and weight control by engaging participants in EFT repeatedly throughout the day. These efforts may benefit from minimizing the amount of time required for measurement and implementation of EFT. Using Amazon Mechanical Turk in the present study, we show that EFT effectively reduces delay discounting in overweight/obese participants (N = 131) using the recently developed 5-trial, adjusting-delay discounting task, which can be completed rapidly (25 s) and is therefore ideally suited for ecological momentary assessment. Moreover, measures of delay discounting from this task were strongly correlated with those from the commonly used adjusting-amount task (r = .859). Significant effects of EFT on discounting, however, depended on the number of future events participants generated and imagined. Use of a range of events and future time frames (as is typical in the literature) significantly reduce...Continue Reading

References

Oct 16, 2001·Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior·J MyersonM Warusawitharana
Jun 11, 2008·Experimental and Clinical Psychopharmacology·Matthew W Johnson, Warren K Bickel
May 10, 2011·Diabetes & Metabolism·G ReachH Le Clésiau
Jan 25, 2013·Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior·Mikhail N KoffarnusWarren K Bickel
Sep 12, 2013·Psychological Science·Tinuke Oluyomi DanielLeonard H Epstein
Apr 9, 2014·Experimental and Clinical Psychopharmacology·Mikhail N Koffarnus, Warren K Bickel
Nov 13, 2015·Eating Behaviors·Jessica O'NeillLeonard H Epstein
Jun 2, 2016·Alcoholism, Clinical and Experimental Research·Sarah E SniderWarren K Bickel
Jun 15, 2016·Psychological Medicine·M AmlungJ MacKillop
Aug 25, 2016·Psychopharmacology·Jeffrey S SteinWarren K Bickel
Oct 3, 2017·Clinical Psychological Science : a Journal of the Association for Psychological Science·Yan Yan SzeLeonard H Epstein

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Citations

Jul 11, 2019·International Journal of Behavioral Medicine·Han Shi Jocelyn ChewSek Ying Chair
Mar 20, 2019·Alcoholism, Clinical and Experimental Research·Justin C StricklandCraig R Rush
Jan 25, 2020·Perspectives on Behavior Science·Warren K BickelAlexandra M Mellis
Jan 11, 2020·Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience·Elisa CiaramelliGiuseppe di Pellegrino
Mar 23, 2019·The Psychological Record·Yusuke HayashiOliver Wirth
Oct 28, 2019·Perspectives on Behavior Science·Jillian M RungGregory J Madden
Oct 30, 2020·Frontiers in Psychology·Kimberlee D'ArdenneLuke E Stoeckel
Aug 23, 2019·Contemporary Clinical Trials Communications·Dustin C KrutsingerKatherine R Courtright
Jun 14, 2021·Drug and Alcohol Dependence·Sarah E SniderWarren K Bickel
Aug 7, 2021·Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews·Warren K BickelLeonard H Epstein
Nov 30, 2021·The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology : QJEP·Jun-Yan YeYa Wang

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