Training Your Brain to Prefer Healthy Foods

According to new research conducted by scientists at the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Center on Aging (USDA HNRCA), it may be possible to train the brain to prefer healthy, low-calories foods over unhealthy, higher-calorie foods. Published in the journal Nutrition & Diabetes, the brain-scan study in adult men and women suggests that it is possible to reverse the addictive power of unhealthy food, while also increasing the preference for healthy food. Scientists have suspected that once unhealthy food addiction circuits are established, they may be hard or impossible to reverse, subjecting people who have gained weight to a lifetime of unhealthy food choices. To find out whether the brain can be retrained to support healthy food choices, researchers studied the reward system in the brains of thirteen overweight and obese men and women, eight of whom were participants in a new weight loss program designed by Tufts University, specifically designed to change how people react to different foods. After six months, results of the brain scans revealed changes in area of the brain reward center associated with learning and addiction, showing increased sensitivity to healthy, lower-calories foods — indicating an increased reward and enjoyment of healthier food cues. The same area showed decreased sensitivity to the unhealthy, higher-calorie foods. To read more about this study, click here.