van der Laan L N, Papies E K, Ly A, Smeets P A M
University Medical Center Utrecht. Image Sciences Institute, the Netherlands; Tilburg University, Department of Communication and Cognition, the Netherlands.
University of Glasgow, School of Psychology and Neuroscience, UK.
Appetite. 2022 Mar 1;170:105901. doi: 10.1016/j.appet.2021.105901. Epub 2021 Dec 27.
Health goal priming has been shown to stimulate healthy food choices by activating an individual's weight-control goal. The present study combined fMRI with a novel virtual reality food choice task to elucidate the underlying neural mechanisms of health goal priming. Previous research has suggested that the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) play a role in the incorporation of health considerations into the food choice process. Responses may be more representative for those found in real life when assessed in an environment similar to the actual choice environment. Therefore, the first aim of the study was to explore if a novel virtual reality food choice task is sufficiently sensitive to detect basic valuation processes in food choice. The second aim was to examine whether increased activation in the dlPFC drives the effects of health goal priming.
Fifty-six female participants performed an fMRI food choice task embedded in a virtual supermarket environment. They chose between perceived healthy and unhealthy products in a health prime, hedonic prime, and non-food control condition, while activation in brain areas involved in self-control and valuation (vmPFC, dlPFC) was assessed.
There were no differences in relative preference for perceived healthy products over unhealthy products between the conditions. There were also no main effects of prime condition on brain activation in the vmPFC and dPFC during food choice. Across conditions, activation in the vmPFC correlated with the tastiness of the chosen product during food choice.
Although the study does not provide support for health goal priming triggering neural self-control mechanisms, results did show that virtual reality has potential for a more realistic fMRI food choice paradigm.
健康目标启动已被证明可通过激活个体的体重控制目标来刺激健康食品选择。本研究将功能磁共振成像（fMRI）与一种新颖的虚拟现实食品选择任务相结合，以阐明健康目标启动的潜在神经机制。先前的研究表明，腹内侧前额叶皮层（vmPFC）和背外侧前额叶皮层（dlPFC）在将健康因素纳入食品选择过程中发挥作用。在与实际选择环境相似的环境中进行评估时，反应可能更能代表现实生活中的情况。因此，本研究的首要目的是探讨一种新颖的虚拟现实食品选择任务是否足够敏感，以检测食品选择中的基本评估过程。第二个目的是检验dlPFC激活增加是否驱动健康目标启动的效果。
56名女性参与者在虚拟超市环境中执行一项fMRI食品选择任务。她们在健康启动、享乐启动和非食品对照条件下，在感知到的健康和不健康产品之间进行选择，同时评估参与自我控制和评估的脑区（vmPFC、dlPFC）的激活情况。
各条件下对感知到的健康产品相对于不健康产品的相对偏好没有差异。在食品选择过程中，启动条件对vmPFC和dPFC的脑激活也没有主要影响。在所有条件下，vmPFC的激活与食品选择过程中所选产品的美味程度相关。
尽管该研究没有为健康目标启动触发神经自我控制机制提供支持，但结果确实表明虚拟现实在更现实的fMRI食品选择范式方面具有潜力。
