The Journal of nutrition | 2021
Dietary Restraint Related to Body Weight Maintenance and Neural Processing in Value-Coding Areas in Adolescents.
Abstract
BACKGROUND\nThere is an alarming increase in the obesity prevalence among children in an environment of increasing availability of preprocessed high-calorie foods. However, some people maintain a healthy weight even in such obesogenic environments. This difference in body weight management could be attributed to individual differences in dietary restraint; however, its underlying neurocognitive mechanisms in adolescents remain unclear.\n\n\nOBJECTIVES\nThis study aimed to elucidate these neurocognitive mechanisms in adolescents by examining the relationships between dietary restraint and the food-related value-coding region located in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC).\n\n\nMETHODS\nThe association between dietary restraint and BMI was tested using a multilinear regression analysis in a large early adolescent cohort (n\xa0=\xa02554; age, 12.2\xa0± 0.3 years; BMI, 17.9\xa0± 2.5\xa0kg/m2; 1354 boys). Further, an fMRI experiment was designed to assess the association between the vmPFC response to food images and dietary restraint in 30 adolescents (age, 17.6\xa0± 1.9 years; BMI, 20.7\xa0± 2.2\xa0kg/m2; 13 boys). Additionally, using 54 individuals from the cohort (age, 14.5\xa0± 0.6 years; BMI, 18.8\xa0± 2.6\xa0kg/m2; 31 boys), we assessed the association between dietary restraint and intrinsic vmPFC-related functional connectivity.\n\n\nRESULTS\nIn the cohort, adolescents with increased dietary restraint showed a lower BMI (β = -0.38; P <\xa00.001; B = -0.06; SE\xa0=\xa00.003). The fMRI results showed a decreased vmPFC response to high-calorie food were correlated with greater dietary restraint. Moreover, there was an association of attenuated intrinsic vmPFC-related functional connectivity in the superior and middle frontal gyrus and the middle temporal gyrus with greater dietary restraint.\n\n\nCONCLUSIONS\nOur findings suggest that dietary restraint in adolescents could be a preventive factor for weight gain; its effect involves modulating the vmPFC, which is associated with food value coding.