Elsevier

Physiology & Behavior

Volume 97, Issue 1, 20 April 2009, Pages 62-67
Physiology & Behavior

Acute compensatory eating following exercise is associated with implicit hedonic wanting for food

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.physbeh.2009.02.002Get rights and content

Abstract

The efficacy of exercise to promote weight loss could potentially be undermined by its influence on explicit or implicit processes of liking and wanting for food which in turn alter food preference. The present study was designed to examine hedonic and homeostatic mechanisms involved in the acute effects of exercise on food intake. 24 healthy female subjects were recruited to take part in two counterbalanced activity sessions; 50 min of high intensity (70% max heart rate) exercise (Ex) or no exercise (NEx). Subjective appetite sensations, explicit and implicit hedonic processes, food preference and energy intake (EI) were measured immediately before and after each activity session and an ad libitum test meal. Two groups of subjects were identified in which exercise exerted different effects on compensatory EI and food preference. After exercise, compensators (C) increased their EI, rated the food to be more palatable, and demonstrated increased implicit wanting. Compensators also showed a preference for high-fat sweet food compared with non-compensators (NC), independent of the exercise intervention. Exercise-induced changes in the hedonic response to food could be an important consideration in the efficacy of using exercise as a means to lose weight. An enhanced implicit wanting for food after exercise may help to explain why some people overcompensate during acute eating episodes. Some individuals could be resistant to the beneficial effects of exercise due to a predisposition to compensate for exercise-induced energy expenditure as a result of implicit changes in food preferences.

Introduction

Physical activity is currently strongly promoted as a method of weight control. However, in some individuals, a compensatory increase in energy intake (EI) might serve as a barrier for the potential for exercise to promote a negative energy balance [1]. Therefore, the efficacy of exercise as a successful method of weight management will vary between individuals [2]. EI is commonly put forward as the compensatory mechanism responsible for a lack of, or lower than expected, exercise-induced weight loss. Therefore, it is important to identify the homeostatic and hedonic processes which could be mobilised by exercise to influence food intake. For example, exercise may be linked to food intake through changes in food preferences and macronutrient selection [3], [4]. This relationship seems to depend on the characteristics of the population studied [5], [6], [7] and may reflect a biological drive for foods with particular sensory or nutrient properties [8], [9], [10].

Exercise and food intake may also be linked by their rewarding potential. Evidence indicates that vigorous exercise can stimulate brain substrates which are associated with reward and dependence [11], [12]. More recently, ‘Sensitivity to Reward’ – thought to reflect an innate characterological trait – has been identified [13], [14] and is suggestive of a common neural substrate for determining the impact of pleasurable activities including exercise and feeding [15]. It has been hypothesised that exercise may act as a buffer for reward driven eating [15], however it is also possible that exercise has a sensitising action that enhances food reward. Differences in the impact of exercise on food reward may explain some inter-individual variability in compensatory eating after exercise.

Of course, deliberate inappropriate food choices and allowance of food ‘treats’ could also be responsible for increases in EI [2]. Nevertheless, the influence of hedonic processes on the behavioural action of eating can be considered as two-fold: strength of motivational response to obtain available food, and the degree of subjective pleasure induced. Recently, the terms liking and wanting have been used to distinguish such hedonic processes that are either explicitly affective or implicitly motivational [16], [17] and these may represent dual components of food preference [18], [19], [20]. Therefore, it can be hypothesised that hedonic processes – via their influence on food preference – could be modulated by exercise-induced energy expenditure to promote overconsumption in those prone to compensatory eating.

A key issue is whether changes in exercise-induced food preference and nutrient selection are associated with hedonic or homeostatic mechanisms. Recent considerations of homeostatic and non-homeostatic determinants of eating imply that such systems interact in the overall expression of appetite [21], [22], [23]. Since most of the evidence from acute exercise interventions indicates that there is no automatic increase in hunger following exercise [24], [25], [2], other non-homeostatic mechanisms need to be explored. Traditionally, methods such as test meals providing a selection of foods varying in nutrient composition [26], palatability visual analogue scales [27], and titration of the ratio of sweetness to fat in drinks [28] can be used to assess the acute effects of exercise on food preference. However, these methods are not designed – and therefore may not be sensitive enough – to detect more subtle exercise-induced alterations in the hedonic processes that influence food preference. Therefore, this study used a novel computer-based procedure to allow the separate assessments of explicit and implicit operations of liking and wanting for an array of food items [19] to determine the acute effects of exercise on food preference, and explore individual variability in the compensatory response to exercise.

Section snippets

Participants

Participants were recruited from the staff and student population of the University of Leeds. Screening sessions involved completion of the Three Factor Eating Questionnaire [29], acceptance of the study foods and level of habitual exercise (mean = 2.4 SD = 1.2 engagements/week) were verified by self report, and body composition was measured using bioelectrical impedance analysis (Inbody, Biospace, California). 24 healthy females aged 18–40 years (mean = 24.0, SD = 6.1 yr) and body mass index (BMI)

Subjective appetite sensations and hedonic evaluation of the test meal

Subjective appetite sensations were recorded throughout the test days using 100 mm visual analogue scales (VAS), anchored at each end with the statements “not at all” and “extremely”. Appetite sensations were assessed by questions relating to hunger, thirst, fullness and desire to eat. These were assessed immediately before and after the Ex and NEx sessions, and following the test meal. VAS hedonic ratings of the test meal were recorded immediately following consumption according to the

Energy intake and energy expenditure

As expected, differences in energy expenditure were highly significant between Ex and Nex sessions. Mean heart rate and predicted energy expenditure were 94.2 ± 2.7 bpm and 189.3 ± 13.0 kcal for the Ex session and 81.4 ± 2.7 bpm and 47.0 kcal for the Nex session. No differences were found between Ex and Nex for energy intake. Total energy intakes for the Ex and NEx conditions were 1128.2 ± 72.8 and 1018.1 ± 73.0 kcal respectively.

Inter-individual variability in the acute effect of exercise on compensatory eating

Individual variability in relative energy intake (REI) was examined by

Explicit liking

No group differences in explicit liking were found. There was a main effect of time (F(2,40) = 19.53, p < 0.01) with higher ratings after both Ex and NEx compared to baseline (p < 0.01), and lower ratings after the test meal compared to after Ex or NEx (p < 0.01).

Implicit wanting

Analysis of implicit wanting responses revealed a significant three-way group⁎intervention⁎time interaction (F(2,32) = 6.13, p < 0.01). Further examination of the means suggested that Ex exerted different effects on C compared with NC. Table 2

Discussion

This study used a novel procedure to assess the role of food preference in the acute effect of exercise on food intake and revealed some interesting and novel findings. Examination of individual EI following exercise compared to no exercise revealed two diverging response types in these participants; those who ate approximately the same or less after exercise compared to no exercise (NC) and those who ate more after exercise compared to no exercise (C). The identification of this individual

Author contributions

EB conceived of the study and carried out the experimental work. GF participated in design of the study, analysed the data and prepared the draft manuscript. JB participated in the design of the study and helped revise the manuscript. NK participated in coordination and design of the study and helped revise the manuscript. GF, JB and NK read and approved the final manuscript.

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council grant (#BBS/B/05079) and Medical Research Council CASE award (#G78/8223) in conjunction with NRC, Lausanne.

References (44)

  • H.R. Berthoud

    Neural control of appetite: cross-talk between homeostatic and non-homeostatic systems

    Appetite

    (2004)
  • A.J. Stunkard et al.

    The three-factor eating questionnaire to measure dietary restraint, disinhibition and hunger

    J Psychosom Res

    (1985)
  • J.M. Brunstrom et al.

    Dietary restraint and heightened reactivity to food

    Physiol Behav

    (2004)
  • B.J. Tepper

    Dietary restraint and responsiveness to sensory based food cues as measured by cephalic phase salivation and sensory specific satiety

    Physiol Behav

    (1992)
  • J.E. Blundell et al.

    Exercise, appetite control, and energy balance

    Nutrition

    (2000)
  • R.J. Stubbs et al.

    A decrease in physical activity affects appetite, energy, and nutrient balance in lean men feeding ad libitum

    Am J Clin Nutr

    (2004)
  • N.A. King et al.

    Effects of sweetness and energy drinks on food intake following exercise

    Physiol Behav

    (1999)
  • R.J. Stubbs et al.

    Covert manipulation of dietary fat and energy density: effect on substrate flux and food intake in men eating ad libitum

    Am J Clin Nutr

    (1995)
  • N.A. King et al.

    Automatic and volitional compensatory responses to exercise interventions: metabolic and behavioural barriers to weight loss

    Obesity

    (2007)
  • J.E. Blundell et al.

    Cross talk between physical activity and appetite control: does physical activity stimulate appetite?

    Proc Nutr Soc

    (2003)
  • F. Bellisle

    Food choice, appetite and physical activity

    Public Health Nutr

    (1999)
  • N.A. King et al.

    Effect of short-term exercise on appetite responses in unrestrained females

    Eur J Clin Nutr

    (1996)
  • Cited by (146)

    • Acute vagus nerve stimulation does not affect liking or wanting ratings of food in healthy participants

      2022, Appetite
      Citation Excerpt :

      Still, given the reported moderate-to-large effects of chronic invasive VNS on body weight in animals and humans, more mechanistic research is necessary to unravel subacute or subconscious effects of taVNS that could be used to improve future treatments of pathological alterations in eating behavior and food choice. Implicit liking and wanting as assessed using reaction times (Cowdrey, Finlayson, & Park, 2013; Dalton & Finlayson, 2014; Finlayson, Arlotti, Dalton, King, & Blundell, 2011), approach-avoidance tasks (Piqueras-Fiszman, Kraus, & Spence, 2014) implicit association tests (Connell, Finkelstein, Scott, & Vallen, 2018; Kraus & Piqueras-Fiszman, 2018), effort allocation tasks (Neuser et al., 2020), or combined physiological and behavioral measures (Müller, Teckentrup, Rebollo, Hallschmid, & Kroemer, 2021) may reflect such subconscious preferences that conscious choices are operating on (Finlayson, Bryant, Blundell, & King, 2009; Finlayson et al., 2007; Rogers & Hardman, 2015) and, thus, could be acutely modulated by taVNS more rapidly compared to consciously reported liking and wanting. In general, our results support the idea that vagal afferent activation elicits unconscious effects on food choice, which is in line with the theorized role of the “low road” to food choice (de Araujo et al., 2019).

    View all citing articles on Scopus
    View full text