AUTHOR=Perogamvros Lampros , Hasler Roland , Baud Patrick , Cloninger Claude R., Schwartz Sophie , Perrig Stephen 

TITLE=Active Reward Processing during Human Sleep: Insights from Sleep-Related Eating Disorder

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Neurology

VOLUME=Volume 3 - 2012

YEAR=2012

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/neurology/articles/10.3389/fneur.2012.00168

DOI=10.3389/fneur.2012.00168

ISSN=1664-2295

ABSTRACT=In this paper, we present two carefully documented cases of patients with sleep-related eating disorder (SRED), a parasomnia which is characterized by involuntary compulsive eating during the night and whose pathophysiology is not known. Using video-polysomnography and psychometric examination, we found that both patients present elevated novelty seeking and increased reward sensitivity on reward-related questionnaires. In light of new evidence on the mesolimbic dopaminergic implication in compulsive eating disorders, our findings suggest a role of an active reward system during sleep in the manifestation of SRED.