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| Thursday, October 23, 2008 |
| Is your brain an underachiever? |
Few things in life are guaranteed, but we never expect our body or our brain to betray us. My friend Neil’s father takes no medication, and doesn’t need glasses. He’s tall, still slender, and ‘sharp as a tack’ at 90 years old. My husband’s favorite T-shirt says “Exercise, Eat right, Die Anyway.” Optimist or pessimist, athlete or underachiever, your body is your only ride and some of us are determined to choose how we travel. Our bodies don’t always cooperate. A brand new study, reported by Lauran Neergaard of the Associated Press, may explain why some of us are steering a sporty convertible, and some have inherited the family station wagon.
“A healthy diet and plenty of exercise are the main factors in whether someone is overweight, but scientists have long known that genetics also play a major role in obesity.” If the body of your dreams is only available in your sleep, “your brain’s ability to sense pleasure may be the culprit.” Inside your brain is “a key region called the dorsal striatum, a dopamine rich pleasure center”. Dr. Eric Stice, “a senior scientist at the Oregon Research Institute” found “that this region becomes active when the brain senses pleasure, yet that brain region was far less active in overweight people than in lean people. When the brain doesn’t sense enough gratification from food, people may overeat to compensate.” Scientists now believe “the obese have fewer dopamine receptors in their brains than lean people. Those who carry a particular Gene version, called Taq1A1, especially women with that gene version, are more likely to gain weight.”
Dr. Nora Volkow “of the National Institute of Drug Abuse notes that this study takes the gene associated with greater vulnerability for obesity and asks the question why. What is it doing to the way the brain is functioning that would make a person more vulnerable to compulsively eat food and become obese?” Dr. Volkow “wonders if instead of overeating to compensate for the lack of pleasure, the study really might show that these people with malfunctioning dopamine in fact eat because they are impulsive.”
This “small but first-of-a- kind study with few gene carriers must be verified.” It may raise more questions than answers now, but it seems to offer an explanation to those tormented by their brain’s inability to signal “satisfaction.” Those who may feel driven to seek fulfillment in unhealthy ways can watch and hope as “Dr. Stice, a clinical psychologist who has long studied obesity” looks toward future applications of his research. “If doctors could determine who carries the at-risk gene, children especially could be steered toward recreational sports or other things that give them satisfaction and pleasure and dopamine that aren’t food…and not get their brains used to having crappy food.” He reminds all of us “Don’t get your brains used to it, he said of non-nutritious food. I would not buy Ho Ho’s for lunch every day, because the more you eat, the more you crave.”
- Nancy
Labels: Mind-Body Connection, Nancy, Recent Research
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posted by The Sensei Team @ Thursday, October 23, 2008   |
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