Are Sugary Foods Addictive?
Channel: NutritionFacts.org
Date: 2013-11-18

Evidence from PET scans suggests brain activity changes from the overconsumption of sugar may parallel that of drug addiction. Diminished "pleasure center" dopamine pathway sensitivity in obese individuals may be analogous to that found in cocaine addicts and alcoholics.

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Tips on moving our children away from junk food can be found in my videos Tricks to Get Kids to Eat Healthier at Home (http://nutritionfacts.org/video/tricks-to-get-kids-to-eat-healthier-at-home) and Tricks to Get Kids to Eat Healthier at School (http://nutritionfacts.org/video/tricks-to-get-kids-to-eat-healthier-at-school).

What about artificial sweeteners? They could still have adverse effects regardless of their individual chemistry. See my 3-part series:

1. How Diet Soda Could Make Us Gain Weight (http://nutritionfacts.org/video/how-diet-soda-could-make-us-gain-weight)
2. Neurobiology of Artificial Sweeteners (http://nutritionfacts.org/video/neurobiology-of-artificial-sweeteners)
3. Unsweetening the Diet (http://nutritionfacts.org/video/unsweetening-the-diet)

What about fatty foods like meat? That's in Are Fatty Foods Addictive? (http://nutritionfacts.org/video/are-fatty-foods-addictive).

Image Credit: Ryan Greenberg, luís perez, JLM Photography, JeHu68, Dave77459, and Mark Crawley via flickr; Evan-Amos, WiseMan42, and National Cancer Institute via Wikimedia; and the United States Department of Justice, Drug Enforcement Agency.

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