TUESDAY, Aug. 2 (HealthDay News) -- Personal choices in weight control are affected by three neurobehavioral processes, including food reward, inhibitory control, and time discounting; and understanding these processes may help control obesity, according to a commentary published in the August issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association.
Bradley M. Appelhans, Ph.D., from the Rush University Medical Centre in Chicago, and colleagues presented a scientifically informed framework to show the impact of personal choice on obesity. They proposed a model comprising neurobehavioral processes which are consistently implicated in obesity and overeating, and looked at the implications of this model.
The investigators proposed three neurobehavioral processes that could affect personal choices in obesity control. The food reward process, mediated by the mesolimbic dopamine system, increases the motivation to consume palatable food, and removing palatable food cues from personal environments could prevent its activation. Inhibitory control is mediated by prefrontal cortex, especially dorsolateral, and causes an inhibition to eating. Avoiding challenges to inhibitory control (including buffets and restaurants), managing stress, and keeping high-energy foods out of reach when stress is anticipated prevents the disruption of inhibitory control. Time discounting is mediated by an interaction between the mesolimbic system and prefrontal cortex. This mediates immediate pleasure from eating and greatly affects the decision to eat versus realizing the delayed benefits of weight control. This can be controlled by focusing on short-term weight control goals, and advising patients to prepare healthy food in advance.
"Dietary lapses or failures should be conceptualized as the result of brain systems interacting with a toxic food environment, and not as a reflection of poor personal choices or lack of willpower," the authors write.
One of the study authors disclosed a financial relationship with Merck.
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