High fat diets can be a source of imbalance in the autonomic nervous system, or ANS. This happens through direct impact on ANS-related functions such as neurotransmitters -- and indirectly by promoting obesity which itself is disruptive to ANS balance. According to the American Heart Association, the ANS restores balance to your body through its two components: the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems. Health problems result when stress creates a state of imbalance between the two.
High Fat Diets and Dopamine Release
Dopamine is "a naturally occurring sympathetic nervous system neurotransmitter," according to Mosby's Medical Dictionary. As such, it is one of many chemicals which help the ANS to maintain balance in your body. Research presented at the 2010 annual meeting of the Society for the Study of Ingestive Behavior and summarized by Science Daily, compared rats given a high fat diet to controls receiving a diet low in fat. The high fat diet reduced dopamine release and dopamine re-uptake, suggesting such diets can disrupt ANS balance in parts of the brain related to motivation and food reward.
Dopamine and Obesity
Food and addictive drugs stimulate dopamine production in reward circuits of the brain, according to scientists at the Department of Neurology at the University of Munster in Germany. Their 2008 review article reports that low dopamine levels which follow stimulation by an addictive substance may cause compensatory overeating. This result, which reflects ANS balancing efforts, may help explain the weight gain that some people experience after they quit smoking or quit a diet.
Autonomic Nervous System Balance and Obesity
Obesity may promote an unhealthy imbalance between the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems leading to other serious health problems. A 2005 study in the "Obesity Research" looked at the impact of obesity on both ANS imbalance and insulin resistance and found a positive association between the amount of a subject's visceral fat and these two variables. The scientists concluded that visceral fat may act in concert with the nervous system imbalance to promote insulin resistance.
Weight Loss and Exercise Promote a Healthier Autonomic Nervous System
Just as high fat diets and obesity promotes imbalance, weight loss and exercise may help restore your ANS and related systems. In a 2010 study in the journal "Obesity," the authors state that a dominance of the sympathetic, or SNS, over the parasympathetic nervous system, PNS, can be a significant risk factor in diseases of the cardiovascular system. Their study evaluated the impact of two different reduced calorie diets and a calorie restriction diet plus exercise on 28 overweight individuals compared to a control group. The results showed a reduction in the SNS/PNS ratio in all of the study groups -- although the effect was significant only in the group which exercised.
References
- American Heart Association: Autonomic Nervous System
- Mosby's Medical Dictionary; 8th edition; 2009
- "Science Daily"; A High-Fat Diet Alters Crucial Aspects of Brain Dopamine Signaling; July, 2010
- "Nutrition & Metabolism"; Compensatory weight gain due to dopaminergic hypofunction: new evidence and own incidental observations; Julia Reinholz, et al.; 2008
- "Obesity Research"; Dysregulation of the autonomic nervous system can be a link between visceral adiposity and insulin resistance; S. Lindmark, et al.; 2005
- "Obesity(Silver Spring)"; Impact of 6-month caloric restriction on autonomic nervous system activity in healthy, overweight, individuals; L de Jonge; 2008
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