Trial reportNeuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology2018
Effects of Intranasal Oxytocin on the Blood Oxygenation Level-Dependent Signal in Food Motivation and Cognitive Control Pathways in Overweight and Obese Men.
Trial report in Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT06945926 (The Effect of Oxytocin Nasal Spray on Preventing Postoperative Delirium in Elderly Patients Undergoing Orthopedic Surgery：Two-Stage Designs for Phase II Clinical Trials), which is not on this map. Cited by 38 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
The Effect of Oxytocin Nasal Spray on Preventing Postoperative Delirium in Elderly Patients Undergoing Orthopedic Surgery：Two-Stage Designs for Phase II Clinical Trials
Who cites it
38 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 52 citations in OpenAlex.
- Striato-limbic and frontoparietal dysfunction underlying imbalance of reward-motivation and cognitive control in compulsive sexual behaviour disorder: A neuroimaging meta-analysis.Journal of behavioral addictions · 2026Pooled it
- A comprehensive analysis of oxytocin: a potential brain-based treatment to regulate obesity.Frontiers in endocrinology · 2025Pooled it
- Neural Correlates of Anti-appetite Medications: An fMRI Meta-analysis.Current neuropharmacology · 2021Pooled it
- Trial
- Oxytocin Effects on Food Stimulus Processing and Food Intake in Females With or Without Binge Eating Disorder.The International journal of eating disorders · 2026Trial
- Intranasal Oxytocin for Obesity.NEJM evidence · 2024Trial
- Oxytocin Administration Increases Proactive Control in Men with Overweight or Obesity: A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Crossover Study.Obesity (Silver Spring, Md.) · 2021Trial
- Oxytocin reduces the functional connectivity between brain regions involved in eating behavior in men with overweight and obesity.International journal of obesity (2005) · 2020Trial
- Musical Training Amplifies Food Cue-Related Interference in Working Memory.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Oxytocin levels do not change around a meal and correlate with reward-driven caloric consumption in adults with obesity.Diabetes, obesity & metabolism · 2026Article
- The Oxytocin System and Implications for Oxytocin Deficiency in Hypothalamic-Pituitary Disease.Endocrine reviews · 2025Review
- An inverted U-shaped relationship between chronic stress and the motivation to expend effort for reward.Neurobiology of stress · 2025Article
- Fam172a Mediates the Stimulation of Hypothalamic Oxytocin Neurons to Suppress Obesity-Induced Anxiety.Advanced science (Weinheim, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany) · 2025Article
- Understanding oxytocin in human physiology and pathophysiology: A path towards therapeutics.Comprehensive psychoneuroendocrinology · 2024Review
- The Neurobiology of Eating Behavior in Obesity: Mechanisms and Therapeutic Targets: A Report from the 23rd Annual Harvard Nutrition Obesity Symposium.The American journal of clinical nutrition · 2023Article
- Neural activation of regions involved in food reward and cognitive control in young females with anorexia nervosa and atypical anorexia nervosa versus healthy controls.Translational psychiatry · 2023Article
- The role of emotion in eating behavior and decisions.Frontiers in psychology · 2023Review
- A randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial of 8-week intranasal oxytocin administration in adults with obesity: Rationale, study design, and methods.Contemporary clinical trials · 2022Article
- Oxytocin: A Multi-Functional Biomolecule with Potential Actions in Dysfunctional Conditions; From Animal Studies and Beyond.Biomolecules · 2022Review
- Oxytocin as a potential pharmacological tool to combat obesity.Journal of neuroendocrinology · 2022Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
10 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Recent research indicates that the hypothalamic neuropeptide hormone oxytocin is a key central nervous system factor in the regulation of food intake and weight. However, the mechanisms underlying the anorexigenic effects of oxytocin in humans are unknown and critical to study to consider oxytocin as a neurohormonal weight loss treatment. We performed a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled crossover study with single-dose intranasal oxytocin (24 IU) in ten overweight or obese, otherwise healthy men. Following oxytocin/placebo administration, participants completed an established functional magnetic resonance imaging food motivation paradigm. We hypothesized that oxytocin would reduce the blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) signal to high-calorie food vs non-food visual stimuli in the ventral tegmental area (VTA), the origin of the mesolimbic dopaminergic reward system. Following oxytocin administration, compared to placebo, participants showed bilateral VTA hypoactivation to high-calorie food stimuli. A secondary exploratory whole-brain analysis revealed hypoactivation in additional hedonic (orbitofrontal cortex, insula, globus pallidus, putamen, hippocampus, and amygdala) and homeostatic (hypothalamus) food motivation and hyperactivation in cognitive control (anterior cingulate and frontopolar cortex) brain regions following oxytocin administration vs placebo. Oxytocin administration reduces the BOLD signal in reward-related food motivation brain regions, providing a potential neurobiological mechanism for the anorexigenic oxytocin effects in humans. Furthermore, our data indicate that oxytocin administration reduces activation in homeostatic and increases activation in cognitive control brain regions critically involved in regulating food intake and resolving affective conflict, respectively. Future studies are required to link these changes in brain activation to oxytocin effects on food intake and weight.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.