Hedonic overconsumption (e.g., overconsumption of gratifying behaviors, e.g., eating, gaming, etc.) is common in daily life and often problematic, pointing to the need for adequate behavioral models. It has been theorized that when a consumption experience falls short of hedonic expectations people will generally consume more to compensate the shortfall. In this pre-registered experience sampling study we test this idea empirically via our hedonic compensation model, and we examine whether distraction during consumption triggers hedonic shortfall by compromising the consumption experience. Two-hundred and twenty participants received 49 identical surveys on their smartphone (seven per day for seven days), providing 6967 useable data-points. In each survey (if consumption was reported) participants indicated what (e.g., food, media) and how much they consumed, how much consumption conflicted with other personal goals, their consumption enjoyment and satisfaction, their post-consumption need for further gratification, and how distracted they were during consumption. Results support our hedonic compensation model: distraction during consumption predicted lower consumption enjoyment relative to expectations, which was followed by reduced consumption satisfaction, a greater post-consumption need for further gratification, a shorter duration to subsequent consumption, and more conflict between the subsequent consumption experience and other personal goals. The implications of these findings are discussed.

Researchers have suggested that overconsumption of food, alcohol, and drugs could be explained by chronically elevated approach tendencies to rewarding but unhealthy stimuli. Here, we use the example of food to show that dysregulated rather than chronically elevated approach tendencies are associated with negative health outcomes. To this end, we developed a new smartphone-based paradigm to measure dynamic changes in food approach tendencies outside the laboratory (piloted with N = 48). We demonstrated in three pre-registered experiments (total N = 367) that food approach tendencies decrease from before to after people have eaten. We further show that in overweight and obese participants, these dynamics are disrupted, as their food approach tendencies increase rather than decrease after meals. In addition to showing these effects based on traditional reaction time-based food approach tendencies, we also demonstrate these patterns in a novel measure of response force—a measure that has long been used to study motivation in animals but has received little attention in humans. Together, our findings suggest that both reaction-time based, and force-based approach tendencies change dynamically in accordance with people’s need states and that disruptions in these dynamics are associated with negative health outcomes, such as overweight and obesity.

Aims/hypothesis. Pharmacological conditioning, where an association is formed between a drug and a conditioned stimulus (CS, e.g., smell), can influence physiological processes. Evidence exists that it is possible to condition insulin effects in animals and healthy humans but it is unclear whether these effects can be observed in patients as well. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of pharmacological conditioning with intranasal insulin on blood glucose, insulin, c-peptide, hunger and memory in patients with diabetes type-2 and age- and sex-matched healthy controls. Exploratively, we examined sex differences in these effects. We hypothesized that conditioning with insulin would trigger endogenous insulin release, decrease blood glucose and hunger, and improve memory. Methods. In a randomized double-blind controlled trial, thirty-two patients with diabetes type-2 (17 males, mean age=68.8, SD=11.86) and thirty-two healthy controls (17 males, mean age=67.8, SD=6.12) were randomly assigned to a conditioned or a control group. On day 1, participants in the conditioned group received 6 administrations of 20 units of intranasal insulin together with a CS (smell of rosewood oil) while the control group received a placebo with the CS. On day 2, participants in both groups received a placebo spray with the CS. Glucose, insulin and c-peptide were repeatedly measured in blood on both days. Hunger was measured with a self-report question, a mobile approach-avoidance task and a taste test. Memory was measured with an auditory verbal learning test.Results. Intranasal insulin prevented the drop of glucose levels in patients but not in healthy controls (B=0.03, SE=0.02, p=0.027), and decreased C-peptide levels in healthy controls but not patients (B=0.01, SE=0.001, p=0.008). Conditioned insulin effects also prevented the drop of blood glucose levels but only in male participants (for both healthy and patient groups) (B=0.001, SE=0.0003, p=0.024). Moreover, conditioning significantly decreased hunger in healthy participants (B=0.31, SE=0.09, p< 0.001). No effects of intranasal insulin or conditioning were found on insulin, approach-avoidance tendencies, calories eaten and memory. Conclusions/interpretation. Our study provides further evidence that conditioning with intranasal insulin might modify blood glucose levels and decrease hunger and that its effects differ depending on health status and sex. The unexpected direction of intranasal insulin effects on blood glucose might potentially be explained by age as our study population was older than participants from previous research. Conditioning with intranasal insulin might be beneficial for groups suffering from intensive hunger, but seems not be particularly suitable for blood glucose reduction. Diabetes type-2 patients might benefit from conditioning with glucose lowering drugs.

Social welfare aims to support financially vulnerable households by protecting them from financial shocks and providing them with a basic standard of living. Many eligible households, however, do not take up social welfare. We present the results of in-depth interviews with 31 members of financially vulnerable households in two large Dutch cities about their experiences with welfare. We examined the role that money played in their lives, what inhibited them from taking up social welfare, and how they sought support. For many interviewed households, money was a source of stress. We found that the fear of reclaims and mistrust in government institutions were the main inhibitors for participating in welfare programs. Whereas the experience of shame and stigma were substantial inhibitors for claiming local welfare benefits, they were not for participating in national welfare programs. Both formal and informal help promoted welfare participation, but many participants lacked access to both forms of help. We discuss policies that could decrease the uncertainty associated with benefits receipt and give directions for future research.

We empirically test an integral model for healthcare and child support benefits take-up using a probability sample of the Dutch population (N = 905). To examine how different psychological factors, in conjunction, explain take-up, we apply model averaging with Akaike’s Information Criterion (AICC). For both types of benefits, people’s perceptions of eligibility best explain take-up. For healthcare benefits, take-up also relates to perceptions of need. Exploratory analyses suggest that for healthcare benefits but not for child support benefits, executive functions, self-efficacy, fear of reclaims, financial stress, and welfare stigma may indirectly explain take-up, with perceived eligibility as mediator. We find no support for knowledge, support, and administrative burden as explanatory factors in take-up. We discuss the results in relation to the Capability Opportunity Motivation Behavior (COM-B) model for developing behavioural change interventions.

When individuals eat while distracted, they may compensate by consuming more afterwards. Here, we examined the effect of eating while driving, and explored potential underlying mechanisms. Participants (N = 116, 73.3% female) were randomly allocated to complete a driving simulation (distraction condition) or to watch someone else drive (control condition) while consuming 10g (50.8 kcal) of potato chips. Afterwards, participants rated the taste intensity and hedonic experience, reported stress levels, and were then given the opportunity to eat more chips. As hypothesized, participants consumed more chips after the driving simulation. Stress levels were higher in the driving compared to control condition, but were inversely related to consumption amount, ruling out stress as explanatory mechanism. Saltiness ratings differed between the driving and passive viewing condition, only when controlling for stress. The current findings converge with earlier work showing that distracted eating can drive overconsumption, which in turn can lead to long-term health implications. Limitations, implications and potential directions are discussed.

Distracted eating can cause overconsumption. Whereas previous work has shown that cognitive load leads to lower subjective taste intensity and increased subsequent consumption, the mechanism behind distraction-induced overconsumption remains unclear. To elucidate this, we performed two event-related fMRI experiments that examined how cognitive load affects neural responses and subjective ratings in terms of intensity and preference, respectively, to solutions varying in intensity. In Experiment 1 (N=24), participants tasted weak sweet and strong sweet glucose solutions and rated their intensity while we concurrently varied cognitive load using a digit-span task. In Experiment 2 (N=22), participants tasted five different glucose concentrations under varying cognitive load and then indicated their preferences for these concentrations. Participants in Experiment 1 rated strong sweet solutions as less sweet under high compared to low cognitive load, which was accompanied by attenuated activation under high cognitive load in the right middle insula and bilateral DLPFC while tasting the strong vs. weak sweet solutions. Psychophysiological interaction analyses showed that cognitive load also altered connectivity between middle insula and nucleus accumbens and DLPFC and middle insula for the strong sweet solution. In Experiment 2, cognitive load did not affect participants’ preferences for the varying concentrations. fMRI results revealed that cognitive load attenuated DLPFC activation for the strongest sweet solutions in the study.In conclusion, our behavioral and neuroimaging results suggest that cognitive load dampens the sensory and preference processing of strong sweet solutions in particular, which may indicate higher competition for attentional resources for strong sweet than weak sweet solutions under high cognitive load. Implications for future research are discussed.