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Overeating, dopamine and exercise

Stamp Out Overeating

It might sound unlikely but while exercise can help work up an appetite, it could also be a key to preventing over-eating and obesity.

A doctor and colleagues from the Department of Medicine at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York have found that one of the reasons some people overeat is because of a deficiency of a natural chemical in the brain, known as dopamine.

Dopamine is a chemical that helps regulate the feelings of fullness when we eat, so that we eat until we're reasonably comfortable and don't overindulge. (Science is yet to discover why this doesn't work at Christmas.)

The group found that severely obese people had a reduced number of dopamine receptors in their brains compared with non-obese people. This meant the obese people had to eat more food in order to experience the same feelings of fullness as their non-obese counterparts.

The researchers could not conclude whether the brain changes they detected were a consequence or cause of obesity, but suggested that strategies aimed at improving or controlling dopamine function might prove beneficial for treating obese people. Unfortunately, many of the drugs shown to alter dopamine levels are highly addictive. This is where exercise enters the equation.

Studies on animals have shown exercise can increase dopamine release and the number of dopamine receptors, factors which can stop the desire to over-eat. This led the authors to suggest obese people may be able to boost their dopamine response through exercise instead of eating.
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