A new study suggests that liraglutide is associated with the normalization of associative learning in obese individuals with insulin resistance.
By Dr. Liji Thomas, MDAug 22 2023Reviewed by Sophia Coveney A new study in Nature Metabolism sheds light on the activity of metabolic signaling molecules that mediate changes in human behavior depending on the internal state of the body.
The ventral midbrain is full of dopamine neurons that help bring about adaptive behavior by regulatory and reinforcing actions. These control behavioral motivation but also reinforce behavioral actions. Reward-based learning is mediated by the mesoaccumbens pathway, wherein dopamine is projected from the ventral tegmental area to the nucleus accumbens
The mesoaccumbens pathway is among the probable mediators of this link between metabolic cues and associative learning, in addition to the external cues. In insulin resistance, GLP-1 receptor agonists increase the release of insulin in response to glucose, and may normalize motivational behavior, perhaps by restoring normal metabolism, and thus restoring this link between associative learning and sensory cues.
The three key measures assessed included the sensory prediction error, the adaptive learning rate, and the resulting adaptive prediction error. The first refers to the degree of difference between the participant’s choice and the chances that it is the correct choice. When liraglutide was used, this impairment vanished in both men and women with obesity. This led to the restoration of impaired sensory association learning to normal levels.