Working Memory in Overweight Children With and Without Loss of Control Eating

NCT ID: NCT04117542

Last Updated: 2021-02-23

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: COMPLETED
• Total Enrollment: 30 participants
• Study Classification: OBSERVATIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2018-10-18
• Study Completion Date: 2020-12-31

Brief Summary

Loss of control (LOC) eating in children is associated with multiple physical and mental health impairments, including obesity and eating disorders. Little is known about the developmental neurobiology of LOC, which is crucial to specifying its pathophysiology and the development of effective preventive interventions. Individual differences in working memory (WM) appear to be related to LOC eating and excess weight status in youth, but the specificity and neural correlates of these individual differences are unclear. Failure to adequately understand the nature of associations between WM and eating behavior in children with overweight/obesity limits the development of appropriately-targeted, neuro-developmentally informed interventions addressing problematic eating and related weight gain in youth. To close this clinical research gap, the current study proposes to investigate the context-dependence of WM impairment and its neural correlates in children with concomitant overweight/ obesity and LOC eating as compared to their overweight/obese peers.

Specific aims are to investigate:

1)WM performance in youth with LOC eating relative to overweight/obese controls during recalls in the context of food-related versus neutral distractors; and 2) neural activation patterns during WM performance across both food-related and neutral stimuli. We hypothesize that, relative to their overweight/obese peers, youth with LOC eating will show 1) more errors and slower response times during recalls involving food-related vs. neutral distractors, and fewer errors and faster response times during recalls involving food-related vs. neutral targets; 2) increased activation in prefrontal regions during WM performance across stimuli types relative to overweight/obese controls, and 3) even greater activation in the context of food-related versus neutral distractors.

The proposed study is the first to use state-of-the-science neuroimaging methodology to clarify the relations between WM and LOC eating, with strong potential to advance understanding of the associations among executive functioning, excess weight status, and eating pathology, and inform the development of interventions (e.g., WM training) to alleviate their cumulative personal and societal burden.

Conditions

Binge Eating; Pediatric Obesity

Study Design

• Observational Model Type: CASE_CONTROL
• Study Time Perspective: CROSS_SECTIONAL

Study Groups

Overweight/Obesity Control

Adolescents who have overweight/obesity, but do not report loss of control eating.

Observational

Intervention Type: OTHER

Observational data will be obtained through participant self-response, parental response, cognitive performance, and neural imaging.

Overweight/Obesity Experimental

Adolescents who have overweight/obesity, and report loss of control eating.

Observational

Intervention Type: OTHER

Observational data will be obtained through participant self-response, parental response, cognitive performance, and neural imaging.

Interventions

Observational

Observational data will be obtained through participant self-response, parental response, cognitive performance, and neural imaging.

Intervention Type: OTHER

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

• Overweight/Obese (>85% expected body mass)
• Right-handed

Exclusion Criteria

• Currently taking any medications known to affect their weight/appetite
• Report current or past medical or psychiatric conditions known to significantly affect eating or weight (e.g., diabetes, bulimia nervosa), with the exception of binge eating disorder
• Have an intelligence quotient (IQ) in the borderline range or lower, or any condition affecting executive functioning (e.g., recent concussion, history of traumatic brain injury)
• Are unable to read or comprehend study materials
• Are receiving concurrent treatment for overweight/obesity
• Have metallic foreign bodies, face or neck tattoos, or other conditions that would prohibit fMRI scanning

• Minimum Eligible Age: 10 Years
• Maximum Eligible Age: 17 Years
• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Sponsors

Brown University

OTHER

Sponsor Role: collaborator

The Miriam Hospital

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Responsibility Role: SPONSOR

Principal Investigators

Andrea B. Goldschmidt, Ph.D.

Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University

Locations

Weight Control & Diabetes Research Center

Providence, Rhode Island, United States

Countries

United States

Provided Documents

Document Type: Informed Consent Form

View Document

Other Identifiers

1205595

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id