Emotions can increase food intake in one group of persons, e.g. restrained eaters, but decrease food intake in another group, e.g. non-restrained eaters. Furthermore, different emotions may increase or decrease eating in the same group of individuals. For example, boredom may be associated with increased appetite, but sadness with decreased appetite (e.g. Pudel & Richter, 1980). This twofold variability (across individuals and emotions) has been neglected by previous research. Based on an individual difference model, it was mostly examined whether eating habits predispose people to increase food intake in response to negative emotions ( Greeno & Wing, 1994). The present paper introduces an integrative model that takes into account both individual characteristics and emotion features. First, the empirical evidence on variability of emotion-induced changes of eating is summarized briefly.