Experts believe that chocolate shares its addictive nature with something as dangerous as crack. Research by neuroscientists has shown that consumption of fat and sugar combination triggers the brain’s dopamine pathway, which is essentially how our brain identifies pleasure. This is the same reason that causes the people to indulge in alcohol and drugs.
Former FDA chief, Dr. David Kessler, research suggest a condition called “conditioned hyper-eating” — a willpower-sapping drive to eat high-fat, high-sugar foods even when they’re not hungry.
“The food industry has figured out what works. They know what drives people to keep on eating,” Kessler tells The Associated Press. “It’s the next great public health campaign, of changing how we view food, and the food industry has to be part of it.”
He calls the culprits those foods that are “layered and loaded” with combinations of fat, sugar and salt — and often so processed that you don’t even have to chew much.
Overeaters must take responsibility, too, and basically retrain their brains to resist the lure, he cautions.
“I have suits in every size,” Kessler writes in “The End of Overeating.” But, “once you know what’s driving your behavior, you can put steps into place” to change it.
The dopamine producing effects of fat and sugar foods create a cue in the neural system, encouraging the person to get more of the food. “You’re not even aware you’ve learned this,” says Dr. Nora Volkow, chief of the National Institute on Drug Abuse and a dopamine authority who has long studied similarities between drug addiction and obesity.
Conditioning isn’t always to blame. Numerous factors, including physical activity, metabolism and hormones, play a role in obesity.
People who aren’t overweight can be conditioned hypereaters, too, Kessler found — so it’s possible to control.
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