Trait-based food-cravings are encoded by regional homogeneity in the parahippocampal gyrus.
Food cravings can reflect an intense trait-like emotional-motivational desire to eat palatable food, often resulting in the failure of weight loss efforts. Studies have linked trait-based food-cravings to increased risk of overeating. However, little is known about resting-state neural mechanisms that underlie food cravings. We investigated this issue using resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to test the extent to which spontaneous neural activity occurs in regions implicated in emotional memory and reward motivation associated with food cravings. Spontaneous regional activity patterns correlating to food cravings were assessed among 65 young healthy women using regional homogeneity analysis to assess temporal synchronization of spontaneous activity. Analyses indicated that women with higher scores on the Food Cravings Questionnaire displayed increased local functional homogeneity in brain regions involved in emotional memory and visual attention processing (i.e., parahippocampal gyrus and fusiform gyrus) but not reward. In view of parahippocampal gyrus involvement in hedonic learning and incentive memory encoding, this study suggests that trait-based food cravings are encoded by emotional memory circuits.
Key Laboratory of Cognition and Personality (Ministry of Education), Southwest University, Chongqing 400715, China; School of Psychology, Southwest University, Chongqing 400715, China. Electronic address: chenshuaiyu3@gmail.com.
Shuaiyu
S
Chen
Center for Information in Medicine, School of Life Science and Technology, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, 610054, China. Electronic address: debo.dong@gmail.com.
Debo
D
Dong
Key Laboratory of Cognition and Personality (Ministry of Education), Southwest University, Chongqing 400715, China; Department of Psychology, University of Macau, Macau, 999078, China. Electronic address: toddjackson@hotmail.com.
Todd
T
Jackson
Key Laboratory of Cognition and Personality (Ministry of Education), Southwest University, Chongqing 400715, China; School of Psychology, Southwest University, Chongqing 400715, China. Electronic address: zq19910362@126.com.
Qian
Q
Zhuang
Key Laboratory of Cognition and Personality (Ministry of Education), Southwest University, Chongqing 400715, China; School of Psychology, Southwest University, Chongqing 400715, China. Electronic address: chenhg@swu.edu.cn.
Hong
H
Chen
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001931:Brain Mapping / Q000379:methods; D066249:Craving / Q000502:physiology*; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology; D005247:Feeding Behavior / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods; D008297:Male; D009042:Motivation / Q000502:physiology; D020534:Parahippocampal Gyrus / Q000502:physiology*; D013334:Students; D055815:Young Adult
Emotional memory circuits; Food-craving trait; Parahippocampal gyrus; Regional homogeneity; Resting-state fMRI