Eating food is normally regarded as a rewarding and satisfying experience. "Liking" and "wanting" are emerging constructs in a conceptual approach to food reward where separable processes of affect and motivation can be viewed as a major influence on energy intake. Liking and wanting achieve importance in light of the recognition of the contrast between homeostatic (regulation of appetite signals) and hedonic (of or relating to pleasure) processes that control eating. In our obesigenic environment there are good reasons for believing that nonhomeostatic processes linked with hedonics are responsible for overeating. Therefore, liking and wanting form part of the nonhomeostatic approach to the control of food intake.

Many people would assume that liking and wanting are identical phenomena, both of which signify a positive attraction to food. The logical view is that liking and wanting co-vary in a natural two-way sequence. In behavioral terms we assume that a change in liking will lead to proportional adjustments in wanting and, likewise, differences in wanting will predict changes in liking.

Therefore, some researchers suggest that a clear behavioral distinction might not be possible. However, there are strong grounds for recognizing that liking and wanting can be clearly dissociated and have distinct identities. This means that they have much greater resolving potential for understanding the role of hedonics on eating and therefore on overconsumption. Thus, the issue of liking vs. wanting is concerned with the functional significance of these two distinguishable processes, operating within the non-homeostatic (hedonic) domain, for overconsumption and weight regulation in humans.

Liking and wanting appear to have separate and disproportionate roles in promoting overconsumption. In terms of liking, some individuals at risk of weight gain may experience an exaggerated hedonic response to palatable foods, so that foods are enjoyed more and therefore eaten in greater amounts for longer periods of time. Conversely, susceptible individuals may have a diminished ability to experience pleasure from food and therefore consumption of palatable food is driven up to satisfy an optimum level of stimulation. Processes of wanting may also bring about vulnerability to weight gain through increased reactivity towards cues signaling the availability of food (sometimes referred to as incentive salience). Moreover, a reduced ability to resist the motivation to eat when satiated may promote nonhomeostatic overconsumption.

A widely held notion is that wanting rather than liking may be the crucial process in maintaining an obese state. For example, research on chronic drug abusers indicate that repeated drug taking behaviour and strong motivation to obtain a "ix" can occur in the absence of any pleasant sensations during ingestion. Moreover, food liking is often a rather stable characteristic within an individual and appears relatively uninfluenced by increasing weight status. The implication is that liking may be important in establishing the motivational properties of food, but once these are retained it is the upregulation of wanting in an obesigenic environment--insensitivity to homoeostatic signals but overreactivity to external cues that promotes overconsumption by influencing what and possibly how much is eaten from moment to moment.

Finally, it should be noted that under normal circumstances, liking and wanting are assumed to covary, and in humans, few studies have been conducted to demonstrate that these processes can be differentiated. A convincing argument for the existence of two separate processes is that they can be influenced by distinct neural pathways in the brain.

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