Obese Kids’ Brains Show Stronger Response to Sugar: Study

MONDAY, Dec. 15, 2014 (HealthDay News) — The brains of obese children have a stronger response to sugar than those of kids with a healthy weight, a new study says.

The findings support the theory that obese children have a heightened reward response to food, and that their brains could be wired in a way that makes them crave higher amounts of sugar, the researchers said.

“The take-home message is that obese children, compared to healthy-weight children, have enhanced responses in their brain to sugar,” first author Kerri Boutelle, a professor in the psychiatry department at the University of California, San Diego, said in a university news release.

“That we can detect these brain differences in children as young as 8 years old is the most remarkable and clinically significant part of the study,” added Boutelle, founder of the university’s Center for Health Eating and Activity Research.

For the study…