BOB体育

For some, the famous potato chip slogan 鈥淏etcha can't eat just one鈥� isn鈥檛 a wager 鈥� it鈥檚 a promise.

This idea, that food can be as addicting as drugs, cigarettes or alcohol, is the focus of the new book 鈥淔ood and Addiction: A Comprehensive Handbook.鈥� The book, co-edited by a University of Florida addiction expert, is the first to compile academic essays examining the scientific evidence for this controversial eating disorder.

The medical community has only regarded food addiction seriously for the last decade the authors said. Backed by brain-imaging studies and multidisciplinary research, it鈥檚 finally a concept that many specialists are willing to sink their teeth into.

However, since the topic stretches across multiple disciplines 鈥� nutrition, addiction, psychology, epidemiology and public health, to name a few 鈥� the experts in these fields were largely unaware of each other. That is, until neuroscientist Mark S. Gold, M.D., and Yale public health and policy researcher Kelly D. Brownell, Ph.D., decided to bring together the work of many of these researchers and publish their findings.

鈥淚t鈥檚 like an encyclopedia of experts,鈥� said Gold, chair of the University of Florida College of Medicine鈥檚 department of psychiatry.

Brownell, the director of Yale University鈥檚 Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity, and Gold chose contributors whose expertise ranged from policymaking to a variety of scientific disciplines.

鈥淭he merger of public health and policy with neurobiology and translational medicine is a unique aspect of the book,鈥� said Gold, a distinguished professor with the . 鈥淲e wanted to include a wide variety of specialists, as well as to give people on the policy side access to basic science so their policy initiatives might be more evidence-based.鈥�

For example, basic science has confirmed that certain foods target the brain and have drug-like qualities.

鈥淔ood and drugs compete in the brain for the same reinforcement sites,鈥� Gold said. 鈥淒rug-addicted people, once they stop using drugs, always overeat. People who are stressed or in pain overeat. And they don鈥檛 just eat anything 鈥� they eat desserts, pizza or other reinforcing foods that have drug-like effects.鈥�

Food has changed, and so has our access to it. About two-thirds of U.S. adults are overweight, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; but Americans also consume more processed food per person than citizens of almost every other country. In countries where fast food is gaining popularity, obesity rates are similarly exploding. In China, the rate of obesity has increased 208 percent since 2002, according to the World Health Organization. Scientists have very little understanding of how all this manufactured food affects our brains, Gold said.

鈥淲e鈥檝e shown that animals will self-administer sucrose, glucose and fructose corn syrup, and they will become dependent on those as if they were drugs,鈥� he said. 鈥淵ou can even cause them to have drug-like withdrawal. If your company made a pastry, you鈥檇 construct it in a way that鈥檚 compelling, where the ingredients are a combination of fat, sweets, salt or fructose corn syrup and chemicals rather than a strawberry, so there鈥檚 more of a likelihood that customers would eat it again and again.鈥�

Addiction research has been Gold鈥檚 focus for 40 years. When he first started, people weren鈥檛 admitted to the hospital for alcoholism because that wasn鈥檛 considered appropriate, he said.

鈥淲e blamed the patient,鈥� Gold said. 鈥淣ow we understand that yes, the first cigarette may be the person鈥檚 fault. But after that, the cigarette is constructed to incite its own taking. Once the person is addicted 鈥� once a cucumber becomes a pickle 鈥� they can鈥檛 make it back without intervention and organized treatment.鈥�

Gold said it鈥檚 important to educate the medical community that addictions, including food addictions, are diseases and that blaming patients is not an effective strategy for helping them.

In 2007, he and Brownell co-hosted a conference at Yale that, for the first time, brought experts together to discuss the controversies of food addiction. The new book builds on the foundation established at that conference, Gold said.

鈥淭his is an area of growing scientific and societal interest, and this book is an important contribution,鈥� said Peter F. Buckley, M.D., the dean of the Medical College of Georgia at Georgia Health Sciences University. 鈥淒r. Gold鈥檚 work gives us a clearer lens by which to view this important topic. This is not just useful to academics but also to the lay public because this is such a crucial public issue.鈥�

The 485-page book, available from Oxford University Press, includes the work of more than 100 contributors from the U.S., China, Canada, England and France. The 66 essays are organized into seven parts representing three themes: the basic mechanisms of addiction, the addictive impact of food on humans and animals, and possible legal implications and public policy changes.

鈥淲e鈥檙e in a 鈥榞lobesity鈥� epidemic 鈥� a global obesity epidemic 鈥� and I think public health approaches and preventions are relevant,鈥� Gold said. 鈥淚f food is very much like tobacco and the health impact and cost are very much the same, what鈥檚 the public policy?鈥�