4. Discussion
obesity, food insecurity
OBESITY, SECONDARY
We found that people who discounted the future more had lower income, greater food insecurity, and higher BMI, consistent with previous research [The narrow temporal window observed for people with food insecurity may be due in part to the unpredictable nature of access to food and meals. Basic preclinical research in different animal species has shown that animals that are provided unpredictable access to food gain more weight and find food to be more reinforcing than animals that are provided the same amount of food, but with predictable access [The current study suggests that DD, a behavioral task designed to measure the relative strengths of immediate versus delay rewards, is more strongly related to the food-insecurity BMI relation than a more general measure of prospective thinking. We think this may be the case for two reasons. First, CFCS is a self-report measure of how people report they think about the future, as opposed to a direct behavioral measurement of this construct, and while these constructs are related, the correlation is modest. Second, the CFCS focuses on how someone might act to improve their future, but it does not compare the value of immediate versus future decisions, which is central to DD. It may be quite different to think about what you would do in the future if you have access to a very powerful, immediate reinforcer. Third, CFCS focuses on decision-making in regard to general future consequences, while the DD task involves monetary decision-making.While stress is known to be associated with food insecurity [These data suggest that DD may be a novel target to reduce obesity in those with food insecurity. DD is associated with a short temporal window, and the desire for immediate gratification, rather than taking into account possibilities associated with inhibiting the immediate desires for food [As a secondary aim, we replicated the finding that income is related to food insecurity and that DD moderates the relation between low income and high food insecurity [