Scientists from Osaka Metropolitan University show that unconscious neural processes can play an important role in controlling eating behavior
Summary Obesity is a serious health problem in modern society . Taking into account the fact that the results of treatments targeting appetitive behavior are suboptimal, a possible reason proposed for these poor results is that appetitive behavior is driven more by unconscious decision-making processes than by conscious ones to which traditional behavioral treatments are targeted. In this study, we aimed to investigate conscious and unconscious decision-making processes related to eating behavior and examine whether there is an eating behavior-related interaction between conscious and unconscious neural processes. The study was conducted on healthy male volunteers who viewed images of food and non-food items presented both above and below the threshold of consciousness. Oscillatory brain activity affected by viewing the images was assessed using magnetoencephalography. A backward visual masking procedure was used to present the images outside of consciousness. Neural activity corresponding to interactions between sessions (i.e., food or non-food) and conditions (i.e., visible or invisible) was observed in left Brodmann areas 45 and 47 in the high-gamma frequency range (60–200 Hz). The interactions were associated with indices of eating behavior such as emotional eating and cognitive restraint, suggesting that conscious and unconscious neural processes are differentially involved in eating behavior. These findings provide valuable clues for designing methods to assess conscious and unconscious appetite regulation in individuals with normal or abnormal eating behavior. |
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Controlling your food intake can be even more difficult than you think. Scientists at Osaka Metropolitan University show that visual food cues can affect your eating behavior even when you’re not aware of them. Their findings were published in PLOS ONE .
Obesity is one of the major pathological conditions that constitute lifestyle-related diseases and is known to be associated with myocardial infarction, stroke, and carcinogenesis. Approaches to regulating eating behavior are widely used in an effort to control obesity, but approximately half of people who receive dietary counseling have been reported to return to their original weight within five years.
To explain the limited effectiveness of such guidance, one hypothesis suggests that not only conscious neural processes, which are targeted by dietary guidance, but also unconscious neural processes play an important role in the control of eating behavior. However, there were no studies that directly examined the validity of this hypothesis at the level of neuronal activity.
The research team led by Professor Takahiro Yoshikawa of Osaka Metropolitan University Graduate School of Medicine has revealed that in the inferior frontal gyrus, a region of the brain’s frontal lobe that controls eating behavior, neural activity differs in response to visual food stimuli, or images of food, depending on whether those images are presented consciously or unconsciously. Using a questionnaire to assess study participants, the team found that this difference was associated with their scores on eating behaviors, including emotional eating and cognitive restriction of food intake.
These results indicate that eating behavior cannot be understood without taking into account unconscious and conscious neural processes.
"If we can learn more in future research about how eating behavior is controlled by unconscious neural processes, we can combine that understanding with our current knowledge of conscious neural processes to develop potentially more effective methods for regulating eating behavior," Professor Yoshikawa said. .
In summary , we confirm that increased sympathetic nervous activity is induced by viewing food images presented below the threshold of consciousness, as previously reported, and that conscious and unconscious neural processes are differentially engaged in neural processes. related to eating behavior. Although our present study is at the proof-of-principle stage only to show the potential importance of unconscious neural processes in eating behavior, along with reports that unconscious decision-making processes have effects on appetitive behavior mentioned in Introduction, Our findings can be expected to motivate further studies seeking to clarify the neural mechanisms related to eating behavior from the perspective of conscious and unconscious neural processes, and to provide valuable clues to develop more effective methods to assess conscious and unconscious regulations. unconsciousness of appetite in individuals with normal and abnormal eating behaviors. |
