Among 13 overweight men and women, eight participated in a specially designed diet program. After 6 months, MRI scans of those eight people’s brains showed increased reward activity in response to nutritious, low-cal foods. At the same time, their brains’ reward responses were muffled in the presence of unhealthy eats. (These changes weren’t observed among the other study members who didn’t follow the diet program.) “Food cravings are basically a habit,” explains study co-author Susan Roberts, PhD, director of the Energy Metabolism Laboratory at Tufts. Like smokers who grow accustomed to getting their fix after meals or with their morning coffee, many people train their brains to expect junk foods at certain times of the day, Roberts explains. For example: You have a soda in the afternoon, or you always have potato chips with your lunch. That rush of sugar and refined carbs lights up your brain’s addiction centers, Roberts explains. And, after many years of repeating these eating behaviors, your brain forms reward pathways that fire up whenever you eat junk—making it harder to kick your unhealthy routines. “Very high calorie foods are the diet equivalent of heroin,” Roberts says. MORE: The 10 Most Addictive Foods But she and her colleagues have demonstrated it’s possible to rewire your brain’s circuitry so that your reward centers light up when you eat healthy foods instead of garbage. That’s a big deal, because some experts have doubted these reward pathways could be reworked. So how does Roberts’s diet program work? That’s the tricky part. In a nutshell, she says the program consists of meals and recipes featuring lots of fiber, moderate amounts of protein, and low-glycemic index foods. The idea, she explains, is to give your brain the tastes it craves without the big rush of calories. You can find out more about the program’s specifics at MyiDiet.com, but those specifics come with a price tag. (There are a few free recipes to give you an idea of what it’s all about.) You can also learn about breaking entrenched junk food addictions by checking out these steps 7 Steps to Beat Your Sugar Habit. The biggest takeaway from this new study: don’t assume you’re stuck forever with your junk food cravings. Like other bad habits, you can break your addiction to unhealthy foods. MORE: Signs, Symptoms, And Treatment For Food Addiction
