Cell Reports
Published December 4, 2018
Vulnerability to obesity includes eating in response to food cues, which increase influence through conditioning. Conditioning is largely driven by dopamine, believed to encode the difference between expected and actual rewards. In this study, researchers use fMRI to show a gut-derived hormone that triggers hunger and eating also stimulates dopamine to adjust food-cue learning. Participants injected with the hormone responded faster to food-odor cues and perceived them to be more pleasant.
Corresponding author: Alain Dagher, McGill University – alain.dagher@mcgill.ca
