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Objective: Adolescents' snacking habits are driven by both explicit reflective and implicit hedonic processes. Hedonic pathways and differences in sensitivity to food rewards in addition to reflective determinants should be considered. The present study evaluated the feasibility and impact of a mobile phone-delivered intervention, incorporating explicit reflective and implicit rewarding strategies, on adolescents' snack intake., Design: Adolescents (n 988; mean age 14·9 (sd 0·70) years, 59·4 % boys) completed a non-randomized clustered controlled trial. Adolescents (n 416) in the intervention schools (n 3) were provided with the intervention application for four weeks, while adolescents (n 572) in the control schools (n 3) followed the regular curriculum. Outcomes were differences in healthy snacking ratio and key determinants (awareness, intention, attitude, self-efficacy, habits and knowledge). Process evaluation data were collected via questionnaires and through log data of the app., Results: No significant positive intervention effects on the healthy snack ratio (b=-3·52 (se 1·82), P>0·05) or targeted determinants were observed. Only 268 adolescents started using the app, of whom only fifty-five (20·5 %) still logged in after four weeks. Within the group of users, higher exposure to the app was not significantly associated with positive intervention effects. App satisfaction ratings were low in both high and low user groups. Moderation analyses revealed small positive intervention effects on the healthy snack ratio in high compared with low reward-sensitive boys (b=1·38 (se 0·59), P<0·05)., Conclusions: The intervention was not able to improve adolescents' snack choices, due to low reach and exposure. Future interventions should consider multicomponent interventions, teacher engagement, exhaustive participatory app content development and tailoring.

Background: During the last three decades, the prevalence of childhood overweight and obesity has increased worldwide. It is well established that different child-related factors such as food approach behaviors (i.e. eating behaviors that imply movements towards food) contribute to the development of overweight. However, research is lacking on the underlying mechanisms leading to food approach behaviors, which in turn lead to overweight., Subject/methods: Via parent-report questionnaires, we investigated the relation between the personality trait reward sensitivity and body weight in a convenience sample of 211 children aged 2.5-9 years. We further investigated the intervening role of food approach behaviors in the association between reward sensitivity and body weight., Results: Unexpectedly, there was no direct association between reward sensitivity and body weight. Despite the absence of a direct effect, a significant indirect association was found between reward sensitivity and body weight through the intervening food approach variables (i.e. food responsive behavior and external eating)., Conclusions: These results highlight the importance of the focus on eating behaviors as well as trait characteristics in prevention programs for overweight., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

To understand the importance of the home food environment on unhealthy food consumption in children high in reward sensitivity, this study tested the hypothesis that the home availability of unhealthy food moderates the effect of reward sensitivity on children's fast-food consumption frequency, exerted via food cue responsiveness. Children between 7.5 and 14 years (n = 174, 50.6% boys) reported on reward sensitivity and food cue responsiveness (by means of the subscale 'external eating'). Their height and weight were measured. Parents reported on their children's fast-food consumption frequency, food cue responsiveness (by means of the subscale 'food responsiveness'), and on the home availability of unhealthy foods. Two moderated mediation models were conducted, one with the parent- and one with the child-reported food cue responsiveness as mediator. Findings suggested that with a high home availability of unhealthy foods, (a) a higher fast-food consumption frequency was found in children high in reward sensitivity and (b) the relation between reward sensitivity and the fast-food consumption frequency was mediated by external eating., Conclusions: The findings point at the importance of the home food environment in children high in reward sensitivity. They suggest to limit the home availability of unhealthy foods. What is Known: • Reward sensitivity (RS) is positively associated with children's palatable food consumption • In adolescents, this effect is mediated by food cue responsiveness, which determines the strength of an individual's motivation to obtain food when perceiving food cues What is New: • Children high in RS may be more vulnerable to palatable food cues in their everyday food environment because of a higher food cue responsiveness • The home food environment may be an important determining factor of the palatable food consumption of these children.

Objective: The current study investigates the aspects of self-regulation skills in overweight and normal-weight children, which may be related to their overeating problems. It is hypothesised that overweight children may show poor decision-making behaviour, and this may be because of two processes: hypersensitivity to reward or future insensitivity., Subjects: Average weight children (n=66) and overweight children (n=64) between 11 and 16 years were tested with the developmentally appropriate analogue of the Iowa gambling task., Results: The results reveal that overweight children show decision-making failure ensued from future insensitivity., Conclusion: These findings provide support for the reward deficiency hypothesis or the anhedonic route to obesity in children.

Previous research assumes that there are two seemingly opposing hypotheses for the relation between reward sensitivity (RS) and bodyweight: hyper-responsiveness model and Reward Deficiency Syndrome (RDS), leading to the proposition of a feed forward process of weight gain. High RS may contribute to overeating and weight-gain among normal weight individuals. Over time the excessive food-intake may evolve in a down-regulation of dopamine (RDS), resulting in overeating as a form of self-medication and the progression to obesity. This process was evidenced in adults showing a curvi-linear relationship between self-reported RS and BMI. The aim of the current study was to investigate the association between self-reported RS and BMI in children (10-15 years). The results confirm the non-linear relationship between RS and bodyweight and support the suggestion of the same feed forward process in children. These findings imply that it is crucial to reduce the intake of high palatable foods in high RS children to prevent the decrease in RS and reduce the risk for future weight gain., (Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)