Addiction to Food: Two Theories

The subject of addiction to food is being put under close scrutiny by scientifically minded people and they are exploring it to find out the root causes and perhaps will come up with something quite like the thrifty gene theory, which alludes to people having a gene that is more susceptible to consuming more calories in response to some perceived worry that a famine might strike in the immediate future.

Thrifty Genes Theory

There is another theory as well which believes that eating too many fats and sugars is some form of rational addiction because the price paid regarding withdrawal from the condition is far more than the price of continuing to overeat. What’s more, the price one is thinking of is really the physical as well as psychological costs and which decision one makes is governed by weighing the pros and cons of each alternative path that one chooses to travel upon.

Thus, to get over addiction to food, governments that follow the rational addiction theory may deem it necessary to enact laws in which the prices of vegetables that contain high nutritious value would be lowered, while the price of those foods that have excessive calories and less nutritious content would be raised, so as to wean people away from the high costing foods towards lower costing foods and thus deal in an effective manner with addiction to food. In addition, it may also be a good idea to lower costs of entering weight loss programs and associated medications, and there could also be better education and counseling available to keep people well informed and less prone to making irrational food choices that will only fuel their addiction to food.

While this may be a good option, if one follows the thrifty gene line of thinking as the root cause of addiction to food, scientists would need to find ways and means to switch off such genes by developing new medicines or even through gene therapy. According to studies on addiction to food, it has been found that the relatively low cost of foods that contain a lot of sugar can lead to its over consumption, which will harm the people that have such addiction to food, and so it is necessary for a solution that makes either the pricing of such foods to be raised in order to discourage its consumption, or there should be some drugs or medications available that will prevent such over consumption.

In the final analysis it can be said that both the thrifty gene and rational addiction theories regarding addiction to food are equally valid and that it requires re-education of people about proper eating habits and also providing them with drugs and medicines that will help them overcome their addiction to food.