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GUVEN POLAT
In the never-ending search for ways to help people eat healthy, scientists have been looking into brain stimulation, specifically, sending a weak electrical current to the brain through two scalp electrodes—a technique called transcranial direct current stimulation. It has previously shown promise in limiting both food cravings and consumption in people, but in a study published yesterday (January 9) in Royal Society Open Science, researchers didn’t find any effects of tDCS on food-related behavior, indicating that the technique’s use needs another look.
“The good things about the study are the large sample size and the fact that it’s fairly rigorous,” says Mark George, a psychiatrist and neurologist at the Medical University of South Carolina who did not participate in the study. “The problem [is] interpreting studies where there’s a failure to find. All you can say is that it didn’t work . . . with this ...
