ArticleBrain, behavior, & immunity - health2021
Adiposity, Inflammation, and Working Memory: Evidence for a Vicious Cycle.
Article in Brain, behavior, & immunity - health, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 18 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
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.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
18 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 30 citations in OpenAlex.
- Effectiveness of exercise interventions, alone or in combination with dietary modifications, on working memory in overweight and obese individuals: A systematic review.European journal of sport science · 2024Pooled it
- Parent-child separation and cardiometabolic outcomes and risk factors in adulthood: A systematic review.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2023Pooled it
- Penny for your thoughts: A review and proposed model of socioeconomic status, working memory and worry.The British journal of developmental psychology · 2026Review
- Magnetoencephalography in human neuroscience research: planning, piloting, implementation and quality assurance.Nature protocols · 2026Review
- Article
- Cortisol, Anxiety, and TNFα Mediate the Relationship Between BMI and Executive Functions.Stress and health : journal of the International Society for the Investigation of Stress · 2025Article
- Article
- A biobehavioural and social-structural model of inflammation and executive function in pediatric chronic health conditions.Health psychology review · 2024Article
- State-level working memory and dysregulated eating in children and adolescents: An exploratory ecological momentary assessment study.The International journal of eating disorders · 2024Article
- Children at high familial risk for obesity show executive functioning deficits prior to development of excess weight status.Obesity (Silver Spring, Md.) · 2023Article
- The Influence of Probiotic Supplementation on the Obesity Indexes, Neuroinflammatory and Oxidative Stress Markers, Gut Microbial Diversity, and Working Memory in Obese Thai Children.Foods (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
- The interconnection between obesity and executive function in adolescence: The role of the gut microbiome.Neuroscience and biobehavioral reviews · 2023Review
- Is there a role for higher cognitive processes in the development of obesity in humans?Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2023Review
- Association between inflammation and cognition: Triangulation of evidence using a population-based cohort and Mendelian randomization analyses.Brain, behavior, and immunity · 2023Article
- Bidirectional Associations Between Adiposity and Cognitive Function: A Prospective Analysis of the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging (CLSA).The journals of gerontology. Series A, Biological sciences and medical sciences · 2023Article
- Inflammation, Executive Function, and Adiposity in Children With or at Risk for Obesity: A Pilot Study.Journal of pediatric psychology · 2023Article
- Swimming Suppresses Cognitive Decline of HFD-Induced Obese Mice through Reversing Hippocampal Inflammation, Insulin Resistance, and BDNF Level.Nutrients · 2022Article
- Article
Corrections and comments
- Erratum issued
Authors and funding
4 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Overweight and obesity constitute the fifth leading cause of preventable deaths worldwide. One pathway through which excess weight contributes to poor health outcomes is via inflammatory activity and changes in cognitive processes. Prior theory has proposed a vicious cycle whereby obesity potentiates inflammatory activity, which alters cognitive processes such as working memory, which in turn leads to a reduced ability to self-regulate and therefore manage weight. However, to date no longitudinal studies have examined this potential dynamic. In the current study, we addressed this gap by assessing the relations among fat mass, C-reactive protein (CRP), and working memory across time in a large sample of 8,536 children followed through adolescence in the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children in the United Kingdom. Adiposity was quantified via dual emission x-ray absorptiometry (DEXA) at ages 9 and 15.5 years old, and inflammatory activity was indexed via circulating serum C-reactive protein (CRP) levels assessed with a high-sensitivity assay at those same ages. Working memory was assessed between these two time points, at age 10, permitting examination of the temporal relations between working memory, adiposity, and inflammatory activity. As hypothesized, we found that fat mass predicted later poor working memory, and this association was statistically mediated by CRP. Further, we found that poor working memory predicted greater subsequent fat mass and CRP, and the link between working memory and subsequent CRP was partially mediated by fat mass. These results thus could be taken to suggest the existence of a vicious cycle of mutually amplifying adiposity, inflammatory activity, and poor working memory over time.
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What OpenQuestion holds
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.