Acute vagus nerve stimulation does not affect liking or wanting ratings of food in healthy participants

Abstract

The vagus nerve plays a vital role in the regulation of food intake and vagal afferent signals may help regulate food cue reactivity by providing negative homeostatic feedback. Despite strong evidence from preclinical studies on vagal afferent "satiety" signals in guiding food intake, evidence from human studies is largely inconclusive to date. Here, we investigated the acute effects of left or right transcutaneous auricular vagus nerve stimulation (taVNS) on subjective ratings of wanting and liking of various food and non-food items in 82 healthy participants (46 women, M_BMI = 23.1 kg/m²). In contrast to previous reports in patients with depression, we found moderate to anecdotal evidence supporting the absence of taVNS-induced changes in food ratings. To test whether the absence of taVNS effects on food ratings is due to heterogeneity in the sample, we conducted post hoc subgroup analyses by splitting the data according to stimulation side and sex (between-subject factors) as well as caloric density, perceived healthiness, and flavor (sweet vs. savory) of the food (within-subject factors). This multiverse analysis largely supported the absence of taVNS-induced changes since the strongest subgroup effects provided only anecdotal evidence in favor of taVNS-induced changes. We conclude that acute taVNS only has a marginal effect on subjective ratings of food, suggesting that it is an unlikely mechanism for the reported long-term effects of VNS on body weight. In light of an absence of acute taVNS effects on conscious food liking and wanting, our results call for future research on the correspondence between acute and chronic effects of vagal afferent stimulation.

Keywords: Food cue reactivity; Liking; Reward; Transcutaneous auricular vagus nerve stimulation; Wanting.