BRAIN TOMORROW
In today’s fast-paced and increasingly disconnected world, feelings of loneliness and social isolation have become all too common. While we often think of loneliness as an emotional state, new research from UCLA Health suggests that it can have profound effects on our physical health as well, particularly when it comes to our eating habits and risk of obesity.
The recent study published in JAMA Network Open sheds light on the complex relationship between perceived social isolation, brain function, eating behaviors, and mental health. Scientists found that individuals who reported feeling lonely exhibited differences in how their brains responded to food cues compared to those who felt more socially connected.
“Researching how the brain processes loneliness and how this is related to obesity and health outcomes hasn’t been done,” says senior study author Arpana Gupta, a researcher and co-director of the UCLA Goodman-Luskin Microbiome Center, in a media release.
Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), UCLA Health researchers observed that when shown images of food, especially sweet treats, the brains of lonely individuals showed heightened activity in regions associated with processing internal states, such as hunger and appetite, as well as increased attention and motivation toward external food cues. At the same time, brain areas responsible for exerting self-control and making healthy decisions showed decreased activity.
This imbalance in brain function may help explain why people who feel socially isolated are more likely to engage in unhealthy eating behaviors, such as having intense food cravings, using food as a reward, and even displaying signs of food addiction. The study found that these altered brain responses were associated with a higher body fat percentage in lonely individuals.
