Mouse‐cursor trajectories reveal reduced contextual influence on decision conflict during delay discounting in anorexia nervosa
Research output: Contribution to journal › Research article › Contributed › peer-review
Contributors
Abstract
Objective:The capacity of individuals with anorexia nervosa (AN) to forgo immediatefood rewards in their long-term pursuit of thinness is thought to reflect elevated self-control and/or abnormal reward sensitivity. Prior research attempted to capture anincreased tendency to delay gratification in AN using delay-discounting tasks thatassess how rapidly the subjective value of rewards decreases as a function of timeuntil receipt. However, significant effects were mostly subtle or absent. Here, wetested whether theprocessleading to such decisions might be altered in AN.Method:We recorded mouse-cursor movement trajectories leading to the finalchoice in a computerized delay-discounting task (238 trials) in 55 acutely under-weight females with AN and pairwise age-matched female healthy controls (HC). Wetested for group differences in deviations from a direct choice path, a measure ofconflict strength in decision making, and whether group moderated the effect ofseveral predictors of conflict strength (e.g., choice difficulty, consistency). We alsoexplored reaction times and changes in trajectory directions (X-flips).Results:No group differences in delay-discounting parameters or movementtrajectories were detected. However, the effect of the aforementioned predictors ondeviations (and to a lesser extent reaction times) was reduced in AN.Discussion:These findings suggest that while delay discounting and conflict strengthin decision making are generally unaltered in AN, conflict strength was more stableacross different decisions in the disorder. This might enable individuals with AN topursue (maladaptive) long-term body-weight goals, because particularly conflictingchoices may not be experienced as such.Public Significance:The deviations from a direct path of mouse-cursor movementsduring a computerized delay-discounting task varied less in people with anorexia
Details
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 1898-1908 |
Number of pages | 11 |
Journal | International Journal of Eating Disorders |
Volume | 56 |
Issue number | 10 |
Early online date | 7 Jul 2023 |
Publication status | Published - Oct 2023 |
Peer-reviewed | Yes |
External IDs
unpaywall | 10.1002/eat.24019 |
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Scopus | 85164515947 |
WOS | 001020235800001 |
ORCID | /0000-0002-2864-5578/work/142233502 |
ORCID | /0000-0002-4408-6016/work/142234419 |
ORCID | /0000-0003-2132-4445/work/142236371 |
ORCID | /0000-0002-6152-5834/work/142241985 |
ORCID | /0000-0002-5112-405X/work/142242690 |
ORCID | /0000-0002-5026-1239/work/142250315 |
ORCID | /0000-0002-4558-0323/work/138225148 |
Keywords
Research priority areas of TU Dresden
DFG Classification of Subject Areas according to Review Boards
- Clinical Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
- Massively Parallel and Data-Intensive Systems
- Experimental and Theoretical Network Neuroscience
- General, Cognitive and Mathematical Psychology
- Biological Psychology and Cognitive Neuroscience
- Biological Psychiatry
- Differential, Clinical and Medical Psychology, Methods
Subject groups, research areas, subject areas according to Destatis
Sustainable Development Goals
ASJC Scopus subject areas
Keywords
- anorexia nervosa, decision making, delay discounting, delayed gratification, eating disorders, impulsive behavior, mouse-cursor tracking, reward, self-control, Self-control, Decision making, Eating disorders, Anorexia nervosa, Delay discounting, Mouse-cursor tracking, Impulsive behavior, Reward, Delayed gratification