Nikendei C, Weisbrod M, Schild S, Bender S, Walther S, Herzog W, Zipfel S, Friederich H C
Department of Psychosomatic and General Internal Medicine, University of Heidelberg Medical Hospital, Heidelberg, Germany.
Int J Eat Disord. 2008 Jul;41(5):439-47. doi: 10.1002/eat.20518.
Maladaptive processing of food cues is considered pivotal in the psychopathology of anorexia nervosa. However, the influence of hunger and differences in processing because of the type of stimuli remain largely unclear.
Memory bias for food-related pictorial and semantic stimuli was assessed in a recognition and a free recall test in 16 anorexia nervosa (AN) patients, 16 control participants with food intake prior to the study (CG-FI) and 16 control participants with a fasting period prior to the study (CG-NF).
Compared with CG-FI participants, both AN and CG-NF participants responded faster to food-related as compared with neutral words (p < .001) in the recognition test. Differences were found for word but not for pictorial stimuli. No group differences were observed with respect to the number of correct retrievals in either the recognition or the free recall test.
The present study found behavioral indications of abnormal processing of food-related and neutral stimuli in anorectic patients similar to those found in fasted healthy controls. Results are discussed in terms of self-schemata in eating disorders, competitive interference, and levels of processing.
食物线索的适应不良加工被认为在神经性厌食症的精神病理学中起关键作用。然而，饥饿的影响以及因刺激类型导致的加工差异在很大程度上仍不清楚。
在一项识别和自由回忆测试中，对16名神经性厌食症（AN）患者、16名在研究前有食物摄入的对照参与者（CG-FI）和16名在研究前有禁食期的对照参与者（CG-NF）评估了与食物相关的图片和语义刺激的记忆偏差。
在识别测试中，与CG-FI参与者相比，AN和CG-NF参与者对与食物相关的词的反应比对中性词更快（p <.001）。在词方面发现了差异，但在图片刺激方面未发现差异。在识别或自由回忆测试中，正确检索的数量方面未观察到组间差异。
本研究发现厌食症患者中与食物相关和中性刺激的异常加工存在行为学迹象，类似于在禁食的健康对照中发现的值迹象。从饮食失调中的自我图式、竞争性干扰和加工水平方面对结果进行了讨论。
