A-Level Psychology: Eating Behaviour

Eating Behaviour is one of the option topics in A-level Psychology and asks you to explain everyday eating, two very different conditions and the biology behind them. This material follows the current content of the specifications (for example AQA's A-level Psychology for first teaching from September 2025, where explanations for the success and failure of dieting have been removed from the topic).

The food-preference questions cover the evolutionary explanation, including neophobia in a toddler and one-trial taste aversion after food poisoning, and the role of learning through parents, peers and culture. The neural and hormonal questions ask you to separate the roles of the lateral and ventromedial hypothalamus and of ghrelin and leptin, including why obesity usually involves leptin resistance rather than a lack of leptin.

Anorexia nervosa is examined through Holland's twin concordance figures, serotonin and dopamine as neural explanations, an enmeshed family described in terms of family systems theory, Becker's Fiji television study as support for social learning theory, and the cognitive distortions and irrational beliefs described by cognitive theory. Obesity is examined through adoption evidence for a genetic contribution and through Herman and Mack's milkshake study, which you explain with restraint theory, disinhibition and the boundary model.

The material offers four formats. The 12-question quiz gives an explanation after every answer. The 17 flashcards cover every key term and study. The printable written work sets eight open questions, including extended discussions of anorexia and obesity, with ruled space for handwritten answers that are then checked. In the oral exam an examiner asks one question at a time, asks you to apply explanations to short cases and gives precise feedback at the end.

The topic touches on sensitive experiences, so the questions describe fictional cases in neutral terms and focus on psychological explanations and evidence. It is designed for students taking Eating Behaviour as their second option who want to practise explaining, applying and evaluating each part of the topic.

• Explain food preferences using the evolutionary explanation (neophobia, taste aversion) and the role of learning
• Describe neural and hormonal mechanisms in the control of eating, including the hypothalamus, ghrelin and leptin
• Explain and evaluate biological explanations of anorexia nervosa and obesity
• Apply family systems, social learning and cognitive explanations of anorexia nervosa
• Explain restraint theory, disinhibition and the boundary model as psychological explanations of obesity

Practice material written by Zestly, based on the Eating behaviour option in A-level Psychology specifications (for example AQA A-level Psychology 7182, specification for first teaching from September 2025, section 4.3.6).