Human beings are creatures of habit. Our behaviors are formed as consequences of the activities we are involved in and the choices we make. This phenomenon can be a good or a bad thing depending on what we are talking about.
For instance, brushing your teeth, making your bed, taking a shower or exercise can be a good and healthy thing to do. Resulting in the body responding by continued health. Whereas habits like, smoking, not washing your hands or regularly eating junk food can be unhealthy or even dangerous, leading to more visits to see your doctor. These behaviors are formed over time and become habitual. The longer they persist the stronger the connections in our brain become to them and the more difficult it is to undo them. These habitual behaviors form structure within the neural pathways of the brain that reinforce those behaviors. We set into motion repetitive patterns that slowly become part of our physiology through neurological adaptation. This is how habits are formed, good or bad.
Some habits are easier to form than others maybe because the body seems to prefer them due to their ability to activate the underlying brain mechanisms for reward and pleasure. Like smoking pot or drinking alcohol can give you. While other habits require a degree of commitment and passion to foster noticeable lifetime habits. Like learning a new skill or sport to playing an instrument. So, what does this have to do with our eating habits? Well to start with, the same thing happens.
Evidence shows that generational and early childhood patterns of behavior can be more deeply imprinted in our brain’s circuitry and DNA. Such that one generation of poor lifestyle choices and set of behaviors, can bleed into having consequences for the following generation. But that’s for another article.
I want to talk about chocolate, French fries, ice cream and doughnuts.
Why do we crave high sugar and fat content foods as representative in the Western diet?
We seem to lack the ability to ignore them in the grocery stores and in our restaurants. What are these category of foods doing to the wiring circuitry in our brain? It appears they have a self-training affect that we have no control over. Do extreme sugar and fat foods make stronger changes to our self-pleasure centers in the brain? If so, how can we control ourselves? How does this preference develop in the brain?
Sharmili Edwin, lead author of the research team at the Max Planck Institute for Metabolism Research in Cologne, in collaboration with Yale University explains, “ Our tendency to eat high-fat ad high-sugar foods, the so-called Western diet, could be innate or developed as a result of being overweight. But we think the brain learns this preference.”
The study set out to test this hypothesis. A group of volunteers were given an eight week period of a small pudding with a lot of fat and sugar each day. Along with their normal diet. The other group was given a small pudding with the same amount of calories but with much less fat and sugar. Then, their brain activity was measured during and after the eight weeks.
They found that our brain seems to unconsciously learn to prefer the high-fat and sugar foods. These foods in particular more fully activate the dopaminergic system of the brain. Or the region dealing with reward and motivation.
Lead team researcher, Marc Tittgemeyer said, “Our measurements of brain activity showed that the brain rewires itself through the consumption of chips and cola. It subconsciously learns to prefer rewarding food. Through these changes in the brain, we will unconsciously always prefer the foods that contain a lot of fat and sugar.”
So, a healthy conscious choice is being over-ruled by a biological, physiological one. Foods in general make a deep lasting impression in our brain wiring that makes it difficult to break out of. So, we need to be careful in what we put into our mouths. In essence we are teaching our bodies to use only our taste buds to make our food choices. While we unknowingly lead it down the inevitable path of disease.
I think about the very nature of our taste buds and why we have them. Of course, early on in the development of man we relied on them to survive in the wild. In order not to eat anything that would be poisonous or could harm us. Back then, we were eating to live. Whereas now we are living to eat. Eating has become an activity solely to serve our enjoyment alone and reinforced by convenience. So, in many ways, placing our pleasures and cravings ahead of our physical needs. There needs to be a way to combine the two together. Once we condition ourselves to eat a certain way, solely based on taste. We put ourselves in the difficult position of making healthy changes relying on our self-control. Which for most of us is too difficult. We need the help of science and research to remind us of what the purpose of eating really is for our body. Food is information for the body to use to create energy.
It seems we have grown to become a generation of people who places the most important decisions of our health on the least important aspect of our digestive system, our taste buds.
It should be noted that both the control group and the test group volunteers didn’t gain weight or have any changes in their blood sugar or cholesterol during or after the eight weeks.
Also, the research team agreed that they felt the cravings for sugary and fatty foods would continue long after this study ended.
Human beings adapt to what they are around or consume. They do so by forming neural connections in the brain that wire it so we can learn how to integrate, adapt and grow. As Marc Tittgemeyer points out, “New connections are made in the brain, and they don’t dissolve so quickly. After all, the whole point of learning is that once you learn something, you don’t want to forget it so quickly.”
We all need to take this to heart and make necessary changes. Our health and happiness depend on it. Good healthy foods can also taste very good. You just need to give them the same chance.
-A Balanced Brain is a Better Brain for a Happier Life-