Doing intensive physical exercise would reduce the desire to eat fatty food.
Delete the fatty foods of sound food can be difficult. Indeed, the desire to consume fat can sometimes be irrepressible. Doing sports could be a solution to satisfy this desire and avoid this type of food. Indeed, a new study published in the journal Obesity has just revealed that practicing intensive physical activity would help fight against cravings for fatty foods.
To eat less fat, exercise
To reach this conclusion, the researchers followed 28 rodents for a period of 30 days. When put on a diet, the aim of the study was to test how well their brains could resist cravings for fatty foods. In detail, the experiment consisted of training rats to activate a lever to turn on a light and a sound. If this action was performed, the rodents obtained a high-fat food pellet as a reward.
Following a period of training, the researchers decided to observe the number of times the rats pressed the lever just to get the indication of light and sound. Here, the aim of the work was to assess the psychic resistance of rats to the temptation to consume their food reward. In scientific jargon, this phenomenon is called “incubation of envy”.
In order to test this resistance to craving, the researchers separated the rats into two groups: one running on a carpet and another exempt from additional physical activity. Of note, rodents did not have access to high-fat pellets for thirty days. They were then again confronted with the exercise of leverage and light. The researchers thus noticed that the rats who had exercised pressed less often than those who had not.
The authors of the study argue that “regular exercise could be beneficial not only physically for weight loss, but also mentally for controlling unhealthy eating habits”.