Food Can Be Literally Addictive, New Evidence Suggests
Food Can Be Literally Addictive, New Evidence Suggests
www.scientificamerican.com
Food Can Be Literally Addictive, New Evidence Suggests
17 comments
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Well, that explains me.
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I really identify with this article as I'm addicted to chips. When I stop I get awful withdrawal symptoms for two weeks, and it takes about two months for me to not feel the need any more. However eventually I fall back into it again because I underestimate it. I've often wished that there was some kind of external control for this stuff.
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I've been addicted to food for at least 30 years. I don't remember being a baby but I heard I ate food back then too. Not sure if at this point I can ever quit
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I could eat pad-thai everyday.
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Same. If I could only eat 1 cuisine for the rest of my life, it would probably be Thai food.
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I love Thai food, but ugh, so oily
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Am I the only person that gets a food high?
There's a line in the article that says food doesn't give a "high" like drugs do.
But I get literal highs off of food sometimes. Particularly beef, some fish, and other high protein meals like those. Typically, it will only happen when the meat is very well browned, a significant "crust" from the Maillard reaction, though it will occasionally happen when there's an acidic or slightly sweet side dish.
Salmon with sweet potato does it almost every time. Tuna steaks do it fairly reliably. Steaks will more often than other beef meals, but even burgers can do it.
Am I that fucking weird here?
It's a literal high. I get slightly dizzy, euphoric, giggly, and there's a distinct sense of well being and connection to the world. It isn't just being satisfied with a good meal, it's an change in mood, thinking and overall perceptions.
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You are not alone. I always just figured it was like a dopamine high or something similar.
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I think a lot of people making jokes about stuff like this may struggle to understand what addiction feels like from the inside and how intensity of desire is not always a function of withdrawal severity.
The popular image of addiction is something like a twitchy looking person begging for the next hit. This is rare, even for extremely addictive drugs with severe withdrawal.
Often addiction manifests internally as a fascination with something. When I smoked it was rare to not be on some level thinking about the logistics of when I would next light up. I also over emphasised the positive effects (many of which in hindsight were merely alleviating withdrawal which is hilarious) and diminished the negative ones.
As someone with a sweet tooth it's not so different to how I feel about treats. It's difficult not to think of grabbing one when shopping, I typically feel a desire after dinner, I often "cave" if something is around or eat it without much intention.
Contrast this with antidepressants, which can cause debilitating months long withdrawal. Yet when stopping SNRIs I had no powerful desires to consume them, despite knowing that doing so would make it stop feeling like my soul was being sucked out the back of my head.
There are reasons to be cautious about lots of research like this, pharma companies would love to sell a solution for example, but it's not outlandish. Nicotine is addictive because it makes your brain light up in certain ways, there is nothing special about the molecule except it does that thing (well and crosses the BBB). If there are other ways to make brains light up in similar ways without a specific chemical receptor it stands to reason that under certain circumstances addiction may manifest.
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Don’t get addicted to water , it will take control of you.
But ofc food is addictive, it’s substances, overeating it, that’s a whole different argument.
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Breathatarians intensify.
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Well, you gotta consume it multiple times every day or your body stops functioning, and you get sick and die.
That sounds like withdrawal symptoms to me...
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Wait until they hear about oxygen
17 comments
No shit, we've known this for literal decades. You can get addicted to pretty much anything.
There’s a big difference between something being psychologically addictive, and something being chemically addictive.
Like, yea, you can technically get addicted to anything. But there’s a massive difference between getting addicted to, say, working out, and getting addicted to nicotine.
So food being chemically addictive is not something that’s been known for decades, in fact it’s been a common topic of debate.
Idk. My wife must workout or she is irritated all day. Working out can be like a drug.