Psychological flexibility and mindfulness explain intuitive eating in overweight adults.
Mindfulness and psychological flexibility are separate levers that both help overweight adults eat intuitively.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Essi and colleagues asked 347 overweight adults to fill out three online surveys. The surveys measured mindfulness skills, psychological flexibility, and intuitive eating habits.
All volunteers were stressed and wanted help with weight. The team used statistics to see which traits predicted eating behavior.
What they found
Both mindfulness and psychological flexibility mattered. Each trait added its own slice of the pie in predicting intuitive eating.
People who scored high on both skills listened to hunger cues better. They also showed less emotional and binge eating.
How this fits with other research
Bellon-Harn et al. (2020) moved the idea from survey to clinic. Their eight-session ACT package raised psychological flexibility and cut problem behavior in adults with impulsive choices, proving the trait can be trained.
Koç et al. (2026) stretched the concept to parents of kids with ASD. In that high-stress group, low flexibility fed emotional reactivity, which then drove burnout, showing the same core process works across very different problems.
McCormick et al. (2025) conceptually replicated the protective effect in autistic adults facing COVID-19 health worries. Greater flexibility softened the link between health distress and mental-health concerns, echoing Essi’s finding that flexibility supports well-being.
Why it matters
If you coach adults for weight or stress concerns, screen for both mindfulness and psychological flexibility. Add brief ACT modules that practice values-based action and present-moment awareness. Two short skills, one clear payoff: clients eat when hungry, stop when full, and feel more in control.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
The current study investigated whether mindfulness and psychological flexibility, independently and together, explain intuitive eating. The participants were overweight or obese persons (N = 306) reporting symptoms of perceived stress and enrolled in a psychological lifestyle intervention study. Participants completed self-report measures of psychological flexibility; mindfulness including the subscales observe, describe, act with awareness, non-react, and non-judgment; and intuitive eating including the subscales unconditional permission to eat, eating for physical reasons, and reliance on hunger/satiety cues. Psychological flexibility and mindfulness were positively associated with intuitive eating factors. The results suggest that mindfulness and psychological flexibility are related constructs that not only account for some of the same variance in intuitive eating, but they also account for significant unique variances in intuitive eating. The present results indicate that non-judgment can explain the relationship between general psychological flexibility and unconditional permission to eat as well as eating for physical reasons. However, mindfulness skills-acting with awareness, observing, and non-reacting-explained reliance on hunger/satiety cues independently from general psychological flexibility. These findings suggest that mindfulness and psychological flexibility are interrelated but not redundant constructs and that both may be important for understanding regulation processes underlying eating behavior.
Behavior modification, 2015 · doi:10.1177/0145445515576402