A study published in Food Quality and Safety on May 20, 2026, by researchers from Jiangnan University and the University of Oxford sheds light on how hunger and long-term use of non-nutritive sweeteners (NNS) shape our response to sweetness. The findings indicate that hunger enhances the appeal of sweetness itself, not just the calories it provides, and that habitual NNS consumers exhibit stronger activity in a brain region associated with self-control when tasting sweet solutions.
Excessive sugar intake is a major contributor to obesity, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular disease, prompting widespread use of zero-calorie sweeteners. However, concerns have been raised that chronic NNS consumption might decouple sweet taste from metabolic energy signaling, potentially altering taste preferences and reward pathways. The study aimed to directly compare habitual sugar consumers and habitual NNS consumers under both hungry and satiated conditions.
Participants rated all sweet solutions as more enjoyable when hungry, regardless of whether they contained sugar or NNS. This boost in liking was accompanied by physiological signs of sympathetic nervous system arousal, including shortened R-R intervals and increased heart rate. Surprisingly, hunger did not selectively favor caloric sugar over non-caloric sweetness, suggesting that the craving for energy makes sweetness itself more appealing.
More notably, habitual NNS consumers showed significantly stronger oxygenated hemoglobin responses in the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), a key region for cognitive control and dietary self-regulation. This neural difference emerged even though all samples were tasted blindly and matched for sweetness intensity, ruling out simple perceptual explanations. The study’s emotion analysis, which used a check-all-that-apply method, involved a relatively small sample of 15 participants per group, so those findings should be interpreted with caution.
‘Hunger seems to turn up the volume on sweetness itself, making it more appealing whether it comes with calories or not,’ the authors said. ‘We also saw that habitual non-nutritive sweetener users showed a stronger brain response in a region linked to self-control. It is as if their brains are working a little harder to keep their sweet intake in check.’
The findings have practical implications for public health and the food industry. Because hunger enhances the appeal of any sweet taste, replacing sugar with NNS in snacks consumed between meals could still satisfy cravings without adding calories. The heightened brain activity in habitual NNS users raises the possibility that these sweeteners might help reinforce cognitive control over food choices, though this remains to be tested. The study suggests that reformulating products to be less sweet overall, while maintaining pleasure, may be a more effective long-term strategy than simply swapping sugar for zero-calorie alternatives.
The research was funded by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (Grant No. 2025YFF1107600) and the Collaborative Innovation Center of Food Safety and Quality Control in Jiangsu Province. The full study is available at https://doi.org/10.1093/fqsafe/fyag046.
This news story relied on content distributed by 24-7 Press Release. Blockchain Registration, Verification & Enhancement provided by NewsRamp™. The source URL for this press release is Hunger Amplifies Sweetness Appeal, Habitual Sweetener Use Linked to Brain Self-Control.