Department of Psychological Medicine, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust, London, United Kingdom.
Int J Eat Disord. 2018 Aug;51(8):771-784. doi: 10.1002/eat.22886. Epub 2018 Jul 8.
There is evidence for altered processing of taste in anorexia nervosa, particularly in the areas of reward processing and hedonic sensitivity. However, research on whether people with anorexia nervosa identify taste stimuli accurately, known as taste sensitivity, has yielded mixed findings. The objective of this study was to synthesize the literature on taste sensitivity in this disorder to provide a basis for future discussion on whether altered taste sensitivity may be also implicated in wider atypical taste processing in anorexia.
Electronic databases were searched systematically to identify published research examining taste sensitivity in anorexia. Search terms were "anorexia nervosa", or "eating disorder", combined with "taste". 18 studies met inclusion criteria.
The review of the findings suggest that individuals with AN may experience reduced taste sensitivity that may improve following recovery. However, there was a significant variability in results across studies, potentially reflecting methodological problems including low sample sizes, experimental designs, and uncontrolled confounding variables.
This review suggests that altered taste sensitivity could represent a component in the wider altered taste processing observed in anorexia nervosa. However, the heterogeneity of findings highlight the need for future research to consider methodological issues raised by this review.
有证据表明神经性厌食症患者的味觉处理发生了改变，特别是在奖励处理和享乐敏感性方面。然而，关于神经性厌食症患者是否能准确识别味觉刺激（即味觉敏感性）的研究结果却喜忧参半。本研究的目的是综合该障碍味觉敏感性的文献，为进一步讨论味觉敏感性改变是否也与神经性厌食症中更广泛的异常味觉处理有关提供依据。
系统地检索电子数据库，以确定研究神经性厌食症味觉敏感性的已发表研究。检索词为“神经性厌食症”或“饮食失调”，与“味觉”相结合。有 18 项研究符合纳入标准。
研究结果表明，AN 患者可能会经历味觉敏感性降低，而这种敏感性在康复后可能会有所改善。然而，研究结果存在显著的变异性，这可能反映了方法学问题，包括样本量小、实验设计和无法控制的混杂变量。
本综述表明，味觉敏感性改变可能是神经性厌食症中观察到的更广泛异常味觉处理的一个组成部分。然而，研究结果的异质性突出表明，未来的研究需要考虑本综述提出的方法学问题。
