Avocado On Toast Is Similar To ‘Drugs Of Abuse’
Avocado on toast has been blamed for many a millennial issue - most notably, rising rents and lack of affordable housing. Go figure.
People born between the early 1980s and mid 1990s have been persistently plagued by criticism of their spending habits, particularly for being partial to a luxury brunch, more frequently than not, one involving avocado.
Well, new research by Yale University has shown that it is hard coded in human nature to want avocado on toast. In fact, the combination is ‘supra-addictive’, similar to ‘drugs of abuse.’
That’s right, the research has revealed that when carbohydrates and fat are combined in a meal or food, the brain sees it as more rewarding than if it only contained one of the two.
Through scanning participant’s brains while they were shown foods comprising of mostly fat, mostly sugar, and a combination of fat and carbs, the clever people at Yale found that subjects were willing to pay more for food that combined fat and carbs, and that these even appealed to them more than that particular participant’s favourite food.
The study showed that when both these nutrients were combined, the brain overestimated the energetic value of the food - which is what ‘supra-addictive’ means.
This is believed to be because, in nature, foods containing both carbs and fats don’t exist.
Processed food that do have the potent combination have only existed for around 150 years. Humans have not yet developed a brain response to the nutrient combination and, subsequently, foods that contain both act like drugs of abuse in our brain.
The study reads, ‘One mechanism by which the modern food environment may promote overeating is by combining fat and carbohydrate to potentiate reward and therefore facilitate the transition to habitual responding as is observed in drugs of abuse.’
So there you have it, the housing crisis isn't the fault of the millennial population, and neither is our love of avo on toast.
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