Molecular Nutrition and Food Research
Molecular Nutrition and Food Research
4 years ago

Serotonin-transporter promoter polymorphism modulates the ability to control food intake: Effect on total weight loss

Serotonin-transporter promoter polymorphism modulates the ability to control food intake: Effect on total weight loss
Juan Francisco Sánchez-Romera, Silvia Sookoian, Carlos Jose Pirola, Marta Garaulet, Gemma Bonnet, Beatriz Vera, Antonio M. Hernández-Martínez, Purificación Gómez-Abellán
Scope The biggest challenge for losing weight is the ability to control the amount of food eaten; the tendency to overeat is called disinhibition. Our aims were to determine whether (a) the SLC6A4-promoter variant (5-HTTLPR) relates to disinhibition; (b) this association could affect total weight-loss during a behavioral/dietary treatment for obesity. Methods and results A total of 2961 subjects attended voluntarily five weight-loss clinics; a subsample (n = 624) was recruited for SLC6A4 genotyping. Total weight-loss, emotional-eating-score and disinhibition-score were examined. We observed that: (a) the reduced ability to control food intake (disinhibition) is implicated in the impairment to lose weight; (b) SLC6A4-promoter variant is implicated in disinhibition. S carriers (low-expressing) of the SLC6A4-promoter variant had a lower inhibition capacity and showed more failure (1.6 times) to control the amount of food eaten than LL (p < 0.05); other factors such as eating while bored, overeating after work at night, or craving for specific foods were associated to the SLC6A4 genotype (p < 0.05); (c) The combination of disinhibition (high disinhibition) and genetics (S carrier) had a higher impact on total weight loss than each factor separately. Conclusions SLC6A4-promoter variant is associated with the ability to control food intake and interacts with emotional eating to modulate total weight loss. It is shown that the inability to control the amount of food that is eaten (eat while bored or without control, overeat after work at night, or to crave for specific foods), is related to difficulties to lose weight. Moreover, S carriers (who have a short allele of SLC6A4-promoter variant, implying low expression) have 1.6 times more difficulties to control de amount of food eaten than LL. On the other hand, the results show that in a weight loss treatment, those people who have such habits of life (high disinhibition) and also the genetic predisposition (S carrier) have more difficulties to lose weight.

Publisher URL: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/resolve/doi

DOI: 10.1002/mnfr.201700494

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