Neural underpinnings of threat bias in relation to loss-of-control eating behaviors among adolescent girls with high weight

Meghan E Byrne; Marian Tanofsky-Kraff; Lucrezia Liuzzi; Tom Holroyd; Megan N Parker; Bess F Bloomer; Allison Nugent; Sheila M Brady; Shanna B Yang; Sara A Turner; Daniel S Pine; Jack A Yanovski

doi:10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1276300

Neural underpinnings of threat bias in relation to loss-of-control eating behaviors among adolescent girls with high weight

Front Psychiatry. 2023 Oct 27:14:1276300. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1276300. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Meghan E Byrne^{1

2}, Marian Tanofsky-Kraff^{2

3

4}, Lucrezia Liuzzi¹, Tom Holroyd⁵, Megan N Parker^{2

3}, Bess F Bloomer², Allison Nugent⁵, Sheila M Brady², Shanna B Yang⁶, Sara A Turner⁶, Daniel S Pine¹, Jack A Yanovski²

Affiliations

¹ Section on Development and Affective Neuroscience, Emotion and Development Branch, National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), Bethesda, MD, United States.
² Division of Intramural Research, National Institutes of Health (NIH), Section on Growth and Obesity, Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), Bethesda, MD, United States.
³ Department of Medical and Clinical Psychology, USUHS, Bethesda, MD, United States.
⁴ Military Cardiovascular Outcomes Research (MiCOR) Program, Department of Medicine, Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USUHS), Bethesda, MD, United States.
⁵ MEG Core Facility, National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), Bethesda, MD, United States.
⁶ Nutrition Department, Clinical Center, NIH, Bethesda, MD, United States.

Abstract

Introduction: Loss-of-control (LOC) eating, a key feature of binge-eating disorder, may relate attentional bias (AB) to highly salient interpersonal stimuli. The current pilot study used magnetoencephalography (MEG) to explore neural features of AB to socially threatening cues in adolescent girls with and without LOC-eating.

Methods: Girls (12-17 years old) with overweight or obesity (BMI >85th percentile) completed an AB measure on an affective dot-probe AB task during MEG and evoked neural responses to angry or happy (vs. neutral) face cues were captured. A laboratory test meal paradigm measured energy intake and macronutrient consumption patterns.

Results: Girls (N = 34; M_age = 15.5 ± 1.5 years; BMI-z = 1.7 ± 0.4) showed a blunted evoked response to the presentation of angry face compared with neutral face cues in the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, a neural region implicated in executive control and regulation processes, during attention deployment (p < 0.01). Compared with those without LOC-eating (N = 21), girls with LOC-eating (N = 13) demonstrated a stronger evoked response to angry faces in the visual cortex during attention deployment (p < 0.001). Visual and cognitive control ROIs had trends suggesting interaction with test meal intake patterns among girls with LOC-eating (ps = 0.01).

Discussion: These findings suggest that girls with overweight or obesity may fail to adaptively engage neural regions implicated in higher-order executive processes. This difficulty may relate to disinhibited eating patterns that could lead to excess weight gain.

Keywords: adolescents; attention bias; binge-eating; loss-of-control eating; magnetoencephalography; obesity.

Abstract

Grants and funding