Division of Human Nutrition and Health, Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen, The Netherlands.
Image Sciences Institute, University Medical Center Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands.
Chem Senses. 2019 Jan 1;44(1):51-60. doi: 10.1093/chemse/bjy071.
Beer is a popular alcoholic beverage worldwide. Nonalcoholic beer (NA-beer) is increasingly marketed. Brain responses to beer and NA-beer have not been compared. It could be that the flavor of beer constitutes a conditioned stimulus associated with alcohol reward. Therefore, we investigated whether oral exposure to NA-beer with or without alcohol elicits similar brain responses in reward-related areas in a context where regular alcoholic beer is expected. Healthy men (n = 21) who were regular beer drinkers were scanned using functional MRI. Participants were exposed to word cues signaling delivery of a 10-mL sip of chilled beer or carbonated water (control) and subsequent sips of NA-beer with or without alcohol or water (control). Beer alcohol content was not signaled. The beer cue elicited less activation than the control cue in the primary visual cortex, supplementary motor area (reward-related region) and bilateral inferior frontal gyrus/frontal operculum. During tasting, there were no significant differences between the 2 beers. Taste activation after swallowing was significantly greater for alcoholic than for NA-beer in the inferior frontal gyrus/anterior insula and dorsal prefrontal cortex (superior frontal gyrus). This appears to be due to sensory stimulation by ethanol rather than reward processing. In conclusion, we found no differences in acute brain reward upon consumption of NA-beer with and without alcohol, when presented in a context where regular alcoholic beer is expected. This suggests that in regular consumers, beer flavor rather than the presence of alcohol is the main driver of the consumption experience.
啤酒是全球流行的酒精饮料。无酒精啤酒（NA-beer）的市场份额越来越大。目前尚未比较啤酒和 NA-beer 对大脑的反应。可能是因为啤酒的味道构成了与酒精奖赏相关的条件刺激。因此，我们研究了在预期饮用普通啤酒的环境中，口腔接触含酒精或不含酒精的 NA-beer 是否会在与奖赏相关的区域引起类似的大脑反应。我们使用功能磁共振成像（fMRI）对 21 名经常饮用啤酒的健康男性进行了扫描。参与者接触到的单词提示会递上 10 毫升冰镇啤酒或碳酸水（对照），然后是含酒精或不含酒精的 NA-beer 或水（对照）。啤酒的酒精含量没有信号提示。啤酒提示在初级视觉皮层、补充运动区（与奖赏相关的区域）和双侧额下回/额前回的激活程度低于对照提示。在品尝过程中，两种啤酒之间没有显著差异。吞咽后，下额叶/前岛和背侧前额皮质（额上回）中，含酒精的啤酒比 NA-beer 的激活程度更高。这似乎是由于乙醇的感觉刺激，而不是奖赏处理。总之，当在预期饮用普通啤酒的环境中，我们发现饮用含酒精和不含酒精的 NA-beer 时，急性大脑奖赏没有差异。这表明，在普通消费者中，啤酒的味道而不是酒精的存在是促使他们消费的主要因素。
