Eating sweet food can do more than satisfy a craving.
A new study, which was published online in the journal Hippocampus, suggests that eating sweet food could activate the part of the brain that is important in forming memories, according to the news outlet HNGN.
Researchers reportedly found that the dorsal hippocampus, a brain region crucial for episodic memory, is activated when sweet treats are consumed, according to Georgia State University.
“We think that episodic memory can be used to control eating behavior," said Marise Parent, professor in the Neuroscience Institute at Georgia State.
“We make decisions like 'I probably won't eat now. I had a big breakfast.' We make decisions based on our memory of what and when we ate."
For the study, rats were given a meal consisting of a sweetened solution of either sucrose or saccharin, according to Science Daily. It was reportedly found that these solutions helped in increasing the expression of the synaptic plasticity marker called activity-regulated cytoskeleton-associated protein (Arc) in dorsal hippocampal neurons in the rats.
The recent findings are important as forming memories of meals is reportedly important to a healthy diet. Episodic memory could actually prevent people from overeating and snacking too much.
Disrupting the encoding of the memory of a meal in humans could increase the amount of food they consume during the next meal, according to a London-based study.
The research team is now reportedly planning on determining whether nutritionally balanced liquid or solid diets that typically contain protein, fat and carbohydrates have the similar effect as sweet foods do.
