Logo image
Back
Computerized neurocognitive training for improving dietary health and facilitating weight loss
Journal article   Open access   Peer reviewed

Computerized neurocognitive training for improving dietary health and facilitating weight loss

Evan M Forman, Stephanie M Manasse, Diane H Dallal, Rebecca J Crochiere, Caitlin M Loyka, Meghan L Butryn, Adrienne S Juarascio and Katrijn Houben
Journal of behavioral medicine, v 42(6), pp 1029-1040
Dec 2019
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10865-019-00024-5
PMID: 30891657
Featured in Collection :   UN Sustainable Development Goals @ Drexel
url
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10865-019-00024-5View
Published, Version of Record (VoR)Open Access (License Unspecified),  Open

Abstract

Adult Diet Female Health Behavior Humans Male Middle Aged Overweight - psychology Overweight - therapy Reward Therapy, Computer-Assisted Treatment Outcome Weight Loss
Nearly 70% of Americans are overweight, in large part because of overconsumption of high-calorie foods such as sweets. Reducing sweets is difficult because powerful drives toward reward overwhelm inhibitory control (i.e., the ability to withhold a prepotent response) capacities. Computerized inhibitory control trainings (ICTs) have shown positive outcomes, but impact on real-world health behavior has been variable, potentially because of limitations inherent in existing paradigms, e.g., low in frequency, intrinsic enjoyment, personalization, and ability to adapt to increasing ability. The present study aimed to assess the feasibility, acceptability, and efficacy of a gamified and non-gamified, daily, personalized, and adaptive ICT designed to facilitate weight loss by targeting consumption of sweets. Participants (N = 106) were randomized to one of four conditions in a 2 (gamified vs. non-gamified) by 2 (ICT vs. sham) factorial design. Participants were prescribed a no-added-sugar diet and completed 42 daily, at-home trainings, followed by two weekly booster trainings. Results indicated that the ICTs were feasible and acceptable. Surprisingly, compliance to the 44 trainings was excellent (88.8%) and equivalent across both gamified and non-gamified conditions. As hypothesized, the impact of ICT on weight loss was moderated by implicit preference for sweet foods [F(1,95) = 6.17, p = .02] such that only those with higher-than-average implicit preference benefited (8-week weight losses for ICT were 3.1% vs. 2.2% for sham). A marginally significant effect was observed for gamification to reduce the impact of ICT. Implications of findings for continued development of ICTs to impact health behavior are discussed.

Metrics

7 Record Views
41 citations in Web of Science
45 citations in Scopus

Details

UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

This publication has contributed to the advancement of the following goals:

#3 Good Health and Well-Being
#5 Gender Equality

InCites Highlights

Data related to this publication, from InCites Benchmarking & Analytics tool:

Collaboration types
Domestic collaboration
International collaboration
Web of Science research areas
Psychology, Clinical
Logo image