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When fed a diet of high-fat, high-calorie food, the "pleasure centers" in the brains of mice apparently become less sensitive, feeding into (pun intended) a feedback lop of over-eating. So says research just released on the topic.
"Not only did we find that the animals' brain reward circuits became less responsive as they continued to overeat and become obese," said senior author Paul J. Kenny, PhD, of the Scripps Research Institute in Jupiter, Fla., "but that decrease in responsiveness was similar to what our laboratory has seen previously in rats as they become addicted to cocaine or heroin. The data suggest that obesity and addiction may result from common neuroadaptations," he said.
The implication that food can act as a kind of drug (biochemically as well as metaphorically) is clear...
Seems like a lot more work would need to be done, but an interesting finding. I am wondering why in the experiment they seem to make the healthy food option "unpalatable"? Perhaps I am reading this wrong, but sems like that is the fundamental assumption that healthy good dones't taste good needs to be challanged more even in this reasearch(?)
AY
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