Differences in Attentional Biases to Food Cues between Obese and Healthy Weight Individuals as Measured by a Stroop Task and Electroencephalographic Indices

Abstract

Event Abstract Back to Event Differences in Attentional Biases to Food Cues between Obese and Healthy Weight Individuals as Measured by a Stroop Task and Electroencephalographic Indices Joshua Hendrikse1*, Melissa Hayden1 and Emily Kothe1 1 Deakin University, Psychology, Australia Obesity is now the most common chronic physical illness in Westernized society. With a relative lack of successful interventions, the prevalence of obesity continues to increase, placing health care systems under considerable strain. In order to address this, research has attempted to identify cognitive components that may be implicated in excessive food consumption and weight gain. According to the incentive-sensitization model, hypersensitivity to food-stimuli creates biases in attentional processing, modulating food cravings and approach behaviour and thus contributing to the onset of obesity. A pilot study comprised of ten obese and seventeen healthy weight individuals was conducted, and aimed to test whether increased attentional bias to lexical food stimuli, would be shown by the obese compared to healthy weight group. A food-modified Stroop task was included to assess reaction time biases to food stimuli, while P200 and P300 event-related potentials were employed as indices of automatic and conscious attentional processes respectively. Contrary to expectations, there were no significant between-group differences found between the P200 and P300 amplitudes during presentation of lexical food stimuli. However, a 16.82ms bias to high calorie food words compared to control stimuli was found within the obese weight group. Self-reported susceptibility to hunger, as measured by the Three-Factor Eating Questionnaire and the P200 high-calorie condition in obese participants were also found to be significantly positively correlated. Collectively these results offer preliminary support in favour of altered cue-reactivity in obese individuals and justify the undertaking of replication studies with an increased sample size. Given the implications of attentional biases on the aetiology of obesity, an increased research focus in this area may aid in the development of effective interventions to combat this global epidemic. Keywords: Obesity, Information Processing, attentional bias, event-related potential, Stroop task, Food cue-reactivity Conference: XII International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience (ICON-XII), Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, 27 Jul - 31 Jul, 2014. Presentation Type: Poster Topic: Attention Citation: Hendrikse J, Hayden M and Kothe E (2015). Differences in Attentional Biases to Food Cues between Obese and Healthy Weight Individuals as Measured by a Stroop Task and Electroencephalographic Indices. Conference Abstract: XII International Conference on Cognitive Neuroscience (ICON-XII). doi: 10.3389/conf.fnhum.2015.217.00145 Copyright: The abstracts in this collection have not been subject to any Frontiers peer review or checks, and are not endorsed by Frontiers. They are made available through the Frontiers publishing platform as a service to conference organizers and presenters. The copyright in the individual abstracts is owned by the author of each abstract or his/her employer unless otherwise stated. Each abstract, as well as the collection of abstracts, are published under a Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0 (attribution) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) and may thus be reproduced, translated, adapted and be the subject of derivative works provided the authors and Frontiers are attributed. For Frontiers’ terms and conditions please see https://www.frontiersin.org/legal/terms-and-conditions. Received: 19 Feb 2015; Published Online: 24 Apr 2015. * Correspondence: Mr. Joshua Hendrikse, Deakin University, Psychology, Burwood, Australia, joshua.hendrikse@gmail.com Login Required This action requires you to be registered with Frontiers and logged in. To register or login click here. Abstract Info Abstract The Authors in Frontiers Joshua Hendrikse Melissa Hayden Emily Kothe Google Joshua Hendrikse Melissa Hayden Emily Kothe Google Scholar Joshua Hendrikse Melissa Hayden Emily Kothe PubMed Joshua Hendrikse Melissa Hayden Emily Kothe Related Article in Frontiers Google Scholar PubMed Abstract Close Back to top Javascript is disabled. Please enable Javascript in your browser settings in order to see all the content on this page.