Whether fast food is addictive or not has been a controversial
argument in the past. However, researchers have recently discovered that there
are, in fact, many ingredients within the food that cause customers to become
addicted to it. According to the AOL That’s Fit section online, “researchers at
Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City showed that feeding rats a
diet high in saturated fat, calories and sugar – which is the typical make-up
for a fast-food menu item – lowered the rats ability to respond to leptin, a
hormone that helps regulate eating behavior by controlling how full one feels.
As rats grew fatter, the amount of leptin in their bodies increased signaling
that they were dangerously close to starvation. They continued to overeat and
gain weight.” This study was later proven to be true on humans as well. The
fact that consuming excessive amounts of fats, calories and sugars in a food
can cause us to still feel hungry explains why we gain weight when eating fast
foods. Our bodies eventually become addicted to fast food, yet while we eat it,
our body believes we are still hungry, which then causes over-eating and the
inability to stop ourselves from consuming the foods in front of us. Also, in
his newspaper article “Why Junk Food Really Is Addictive,” Ben Leach states
that, “It is time to stop blaming individuals for being overweight or obese.
The real problem is we have created a world where food is always available and
where that food is designed to make you want to eat more of it. For millions of
people, modern food is simply impossible to resist.” This statement is
extremely true. Many people say that it is the people’s fault for eating the
food, that we should all be deemed responsible for our weight gain. However, it
is difficult when the ingredients in the food are proven to be addictive to our
bodies. Overall, the addictive ingredients in fast food require our body to
crave it more often, eventually causing weight gain, obesity, diseases, or
other sicknesses that inflict harm upon our bodies.
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