What is the difference between these two? Like for example, overeating can be one or the other right?
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Impulsive is a reaction to something that happens in that moment – an “impulse”.
Compulsive is when you cannot stop doing something.
In the context of eating:
* Impulsive eating is when you smell popcorn, you feel a craving for popcorn, so you make popcorn and eat it. You eat it because you just felt like it.
* Compulsive eating is when you cannot stop eating popcorn. You literally scoop buckets of it into your mouth until you get sick.
Overeating is more commonly associated with compulsive behaviours. Impulsive eating, however, is factor in undesired weight gain. Both are expressed as having little to no “control” over eating habits, but from different ends of the cycle: one hinges on your inability to say “no” to eating something, the other prevents you from saying “enough”.
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