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Neural Vulnerability Factors That Predict Future Weight Gain

  • Etiology of Obesity (M Rosenbaum, Section Editor)
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Abstract

Purpose of Review

The current article discusses five neural vulnerability theories for weight gain and reviews evidence from prospective studies using imaging and behavioral measures reflecting neural function, as well as randomized experiments with humans and animals that are consistent or inconsistent with these theories.

Recent Findings

Recent prospective imaging studies examining predictors of weight gain and response to obesity treatment, and repeated-measures imaging studies before and after weight gain and loss have advanced knowledge of etiologic processes and neural plasticity resulting from weight change.

Summary

Overall, data provide strong support for the incentive sensitization theory of obesity and moderate support for the reward surfeit theory, inhibitory control deficit theory, and dynamic vulnerability model of obesity, which attempted to synthesize the former theories into a single etiologic model. Data provide little support for the reward deficit theory. Important directions for future studies are delineated.

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Funding

Support for this work was provided by National Institutes of Health grants DK112762 & MH111782.

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  1. Department of Psychiatry, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, 94305, USA

    Eric Stice

  2. Oregon Research Institute, Eugene, OR, 97403, USA

    Sonja Yokum

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ES and SY contributed to drafting and revising the manuscript. All the authors approved the final version of the manuscript to be published.

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Stice, E., Yokum, S. Neural Vulnerability Factors That Predict Future Weight Gain. Curr Obes Rep 10, 435–443 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13679-021-00455-9

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