Prefrontal Cortex Recruitment to Food Stimuli Differs in Overweight/Obesity and Binge Eating Disorder.

BACKGROUND

At a phenotypical level, the repeated occurrence of binge eating episodes clearly differentiates individuals with binge eating disorder (BED) from individuals with overweight but without BED. Their neural profiles during food-related inhibition, however, indicate prefrontal hypoactivation in both groups. The present study investigated differential neural activations in upper lateral (right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex [DLPFC]) and inferior (right inferior frontal gyrus [IFG]) control regions during food-related inhibition by functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). In addition, activity in reward-related brain regions (orbitofrontal cortex [OFC]) during stimulus processing was measured.

METHOD: Individuals with BED (n = 32), a control group of individuals with overweight and without BED (OWC, n = 21), and a control group of individuals with normal weight and without BED (NWC; n = 31) underwent a Go/No-Go (GNG) and a stimulus degradation task during fNIRS, both with food and non-food stimuli in counterbalanced order.

RESULTS

Most predicted outcomes were not significant. Neural recordings during GNG underscore prefrontal hypoactivation in both BED and OWC relative to NWC, however, with differential alterations: In the Food-NoGo condition, the BED group displayed hypoactivation in the IFG, while the OWC showed hypoactivation in the DLPFC.

CONCLUSIONS

The results suggest differential requirements for DLPFC and IFG recruitment during food-related inhibition in individuals with BED and overweight.