Explicit and Implicit Devaluation Effects of Food-Specific Response Inhibition Training

Area of Science:

• Behavioral Psychology
• Cognitive Neuroscience
• Neuroscience of Eating

Background:

• Overvaluation of energy-dense foods contributes to compulsive eating behaviors like overeating.
• Response inhibition training can devalue appetitive stimuli, offering a strategy for behavior modification.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the effectiveness of response inhibition training in reducing the evaluation of specific foods.
• To assess explicit and implicit measures of food devaluation following training.

Main Methods:

• Two preregistered experiments utilized go/no-go training with energy-dense foods.
• Participants learned to either respond (go) or inhibit responses (no-go) to food stimuli.
• Explicit liking and implicit affective priming were used to measure devaluation.

Main Results:

• Response inhibition training led to significant devaluation effects, both in explicit ratings and affective priming.
• Priming effects for no-go food items were minimal, suggesting successful devaluation.
• Experiment 2 replicated most findings, confirming the robustness of the devaluation effect.

Conclusions:

• Response inhibition training effectively devalues targeted foods, supporting its potential for behavior change.
• Affective priming measures may capture training-induced devaluation, though further research on sensitivity is needed.