NCT04037020

The Chocolate Study 2.0

Assessment of Dopaminergic Neurotransmission in Response to Tasting Chocolate (The Chocolate Study 2.0)

• Status: Completed
• Phase: —
• Study type: Observational
• Enrollment: 20 (actual)
• Sponsor: USDA Grand Forks Human Nutrition Research Center · Federal
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years – 30 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Accepted

Summary

The purpose of this study is to test how the brain responds when enjoyable foods such as chocolate are consumed. The investigators know that eating certain types of foods can make an individual want to keep eating even when he or she is full. The chemical in the brain that causes this is called dopamine. The investigators can measure this response by looking at changes to how an individual's eye responds to light.

Detailed description

The overall objective of this study is to determine dopamine (DA) neuromodulation (changes in b-wave amplitude as measured by electroretinography (ERG)) in response to consuming a highly reinforcing food (chocolate). The investigators hypothesize that orosensory stimulation with chocolates with increasing sugar content will increase the beta wave (b-wave) amplitude and the increase in the b-wave amplitude will correlate with score changes on the Psychophysical Effects Questionnaire (PEQ). This will be accomplished by testing different chocolates (extreme dark (90% cocoa), dark (70% cocoa), milk (38% cocoa), and white (0% cocoa)) on different days using 1.0 cd∙s/m2 flash luminance energy.

Conditions

• Normal Weight

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
OTHER	Chocolate	Participants will be asked to taste commercially available chocolate varying in sugar, fat and percent cocoa (extreme dark (90%), dark (70%), milk (38%), and white (0%)).

Timeline

• Start date: 2019-07-25
• Primary completion: 2019-09-05
• Completion: 2019-09-05
• First posted: 2019-07-30
• Last updated: 2025-04-11

Locations

1 site across 1 country: United States