Food addiction and obesity [Gıda bağımlılığı ve şişmanlık gıda bağımlılığı ve şişmanlık]

The aim of this review is to discuss the concept of food addiction and its association with obesity. The DSM-5, published in May 2013, defines substance related and addictive disorders as clinical disorders indicated by inappropriate substance use within the last 12 months that meets at least two of the following 11 criteria: impaired control (4 criteria), social impairment (3 criteria), risky use (2 criteria) and pharmacological response (tolerance and withdrawal, 2 criteria). An important novelty in the DSM-5 is that, even though it is not induced by a chemical agent, a behavioral disorder, gambling, is classified as an addiction. Eating and sex, instincts that are essential for survival and wellbeing, are also called natural rewards. Dopamine, a reward neurotransmitter, regulates pleasurable and motivating responses to food intake. Repeated stimulation of these reward pathways, as in substance abuse, weakens control over food intake and causes compulsive food consumption. Imaging studies have shown that obese people have impairments in the dopaminergic pathways that regulate their control and reward systems. Studies indicate that even in post-prandial satiety, obese people show reward response to hyper-palatable foods. Thus, food addicts' efforts to lose weight are frustrated by addiction, and they have difficulty in adopting healthy nutritional habits. Studies of food addiction have proliferated recently around the world, but very few have been conducted in Turkey. Community-based studies of food addiction should be conducted to determine its prevalence. Obese people who are also addicted to food should be treated with multiple treatment methods. © 2016, Ege University Press. All Rights Reserved