Hooked Part of 3/17 es of food and were losing control. They | Blinkist Summary Book

Hooked
Part of 3/17

es of food and were losing control. They couldn't stop eating – even when they wanted to.
But what kinds of foods are people addicted to?
By putting participants into an MRI scanner researchers have been able to study our brain activity when we taste our favorite foods. Incredibly when some people taste their favorite fast foods such as cheeseburgers fried chicken and ice cream their brains show a pattern of activity that’s typically associated with taking cocaine. Scientists have concluded that some people’s brains respond in the same way to junk food as they would to addictive drugs. In both cases their brains shout “This is good I want more!”
Of course many of us eat junk food from time to time and most don’t lose control over how much of it we eat. So doesn’t that prove that it’s not addictive?
Well the fact that most of us can eat this food without becoming addicted doesn’t matter. In fact a useful definition of addiction is that it's a repetitive behavior that some people fin