According to a new study released in Psychiatry Research, there are major brain differences in young children with binge eating disorder.
The study, conducted at the University of Southern California, included the brain scans of over 10,000 children aged 9-10.
The findings indicated that unusual development in the brain’s regions known for reward and inhibition may be a contributing factor in binge eating disorder.
“We investigated group differences in gray matter density (GMD) via voxel-based morphometry (VBM),” the authors described in their journal report.
“We additionally performed region of interest analyses, assessing the association between GMD in nodes of the reward (orbitofrontal cortex; OFC) and inhibitory control (dorsolateral prefrontal cortex; dlPFC) networks, and parent-reported behavioral inhibition and approach tendencies.”
What researchers concluded: “Early-onset binge eating disorder may be characterized by diffuse morphological abnormalities in gray matter density, suggesting alterations in cortical architecture which may reflect decreased synaptic pruning and arborization, or decreased myelinated fibers and therefore inter-regional afferents.”
