Is There a Relationship Between Food Addiction, Dietary Quality and Metabolic Parameters in Obese Adults?: A Cross-Sectional Study Example

Objective: This cross-sectional study evaluated the association between food addiction, dietary quality, and metabolic pa-rameters and determined food addiction prevalence in overweight and obese adults.
Materials and Methods: This study was conducted with 134 obese and overweight adults. Food addiction was evaluated with the Yale Food Addiction Scale (YFAS), and dietary quality was assessed with the Healthy Eating Index-2010 (HEI-2010). The HEI-2010 scores range from 0 to 100 (>80: good dietary quality, 51–80: needs improvement, <51: poor dietary quality).
Results: 19.4% of the participants had a food addiction. The ratio of those with poor dietary quality (61.5%) in participants with food addiction was higher than those without food addiction (52.8%) (p>0.05). The ratio of participants with high AST levels to participants with food addiction (34.6%) is higher than those without food addiction (17.6%) (p<0.05). Participants without food addiction have lower cholesterol intake than participants with food addiction (p<0.05). YFAS symptom scores were positively correlated with AST, SBP, and DBP levels and negatively correlated with the age of the participants (p<0.05).
Conclusion: It was founded that a relationship may exist between food addiction, dietary quality, and metabolic parameters of obese and overweight adults. Especially in treating obesity, it is essential to make appropriate interventions to increase dietary quality.