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Food Addiction, Skating on Thin Ice: a Critical Overview of Neuroimaging Findings

  • Food Addiction (A Meule, Section Editor)
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Abstract

Purpose of Review

The food addiction model suggests the compelling hypothesis that compulsive overeating and drug addictions share common neurobiological underpinnings. However, neuroimaging results are inconsistent, and they are difficult to integrate with each other. This mini-review provides a critical overview of the human neuroimaging literature in food addiction and binge eating symptoms.

Recent Findings

Neuroanatomical studies suggest the involvement of the orbitofrontal cortex in food addiction. Functional imaging studies have examined whether food addiction is associated with alterations during reward processing, cognitive control, or emotion regulation. However, these results have provided limited consistency so far.

Summary

To overcome the limitations of current research, we suggest that future studies on food addiction should address four main points: (a) disentangle between the effects of food addiction and obesity; (b) discriminate between causes and consequences of food addiction; (c) address the heterogeneity of food addiction; (d) prevent overinterpretation of results and facilitate replicability.

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Funding

IGG is supported by a Postdoctoral Fellowship from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. AD is funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada

    Isabel García-García, Filip Morys & Alain Dagher

  2. School of Nutrition and Quebec Heart and Lung Institute, Laval University, Quebec City, Quebec, Canada

    Andréanne Michaud

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  1. Isabel García-García
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Correspondence to Isabel García-García.

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IGG, FM, AM, and AD conduct research on the neural correlates of food addiction and obesity and are the authors of some of the studies cited in the current review. Other than that, the authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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García-García, I., Morys, F., Michaud, A. et al. Food Addiction, Skating on Thin Ice: a Critical Overview of Neuroimaging Findings. Curr Addict Rep 7, 20–29 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40429-020-00293-0

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