What if the stomach held the key to understanding how we eat? A recent study conducted in collaboration with the University of Luxembourg and funded by the Swiss Anorexia Foundation (SANS) reveals that gastric signals – such as sensations of hunger or fullness – are more strongly linked to disordered eating behaviors than signals from the heart. The researchers assessed multiple interoceptive dimensions (behavioral, physiological and self-reported) across both the cardiac and gastric systems in 128 participants, including individuals with and without eating disorders. Their findings show that the way people interpret stomach-related sensations plays a central role in emotional, external and restrained eating. These results, published in the Journal of Eating Disorders, emphasize the need to better integrate the gastric system into the understanding and treatment of disordered eating.

https://jeatdisord.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s40337-025-01284-0