Background and aims: New treatment strategies for obesity are urgently needed. Mounting evidence suggests that out-of-control overeating may involve an addictive process. Nevertheless, neuroscience data implicating substance addiction to food constituents is inconsistent. On the other hand, uncontrollable "comfort eating" and "nervous eating" resemble behavioral addictions, e.g. pathological gambling and body focused repetitive behaviors (onychophagia, skin picking, trichotillomania, nervous tics). The brain tends to adopt (hijack?) any behavior that relieves stress, in this case eating. Behavioral addiction treatment methods may prove useful for obesity intervention. Methods: An obesity intervention was developed using behavioral addiction treatment methods and implemented as a smartphone app. Participants were recruited from newspaper and radio advertisements. The 4 month intervention included weekly phone calls and 4 group meetings. First, participants withdrew from specific, craved "problem" foods by abstinence from each food using aversive counter stimuli (foul images...
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