Oreos as addictive as cocaine, study suggests

CONNECTICUT College students and a professor of psychology have found that Oreos are just as addictive as cocaine – at least for lab rats. And just like most humans, rats go for the middle first.

In a study designed to shed light on the potential addictiveness of high-fat/ high-sugar foods, Joseph Schroeder, associate professor of psychology and director of the behavioral neuroscience program, and his students found rats formed an equally strong association between the pleasurable effects of eating “America’s favorite cookie” and a specific environment as they did between cocaine or morphine and a specific environment. They also found that eating cookies activated more neurons in the brain’s “pleasure center” than exposure to drugs of abuse.  

“Our research supports the theory that high-fat/ high-sugar foods stimulate the brain in the same way that drugs do,” Professor Schroeder said. “It may explain why some people can’t resist these foods despite the fact that they know they are bad for them.”

The research was the brainchild of neuroscience major Jamie Honohan. 

A scholar in the College’s Holleran Center for Community Action and Public Policy, Ms Honohan was interested in how the prevalence of high-fat and high-sugar foods in low-income neighborhoods contributed to the obesity epidemic.

“My research interests stemmed from a curiosity for studying human behavior and our motivations when it comes to food,” said Ms Honohan. “We chose Oreos not only because they are America’s favorite cookie, and highly palatable to rats, but also because products containing high amounts of fat and sugar are heavily marketed in communities with lower socioeconomic statuses.”

To test the addictiveness of Oreos, Ms Honohan and a co-researcher, Becca Markson, worked with Professor Schroeder and two other students, Science Leader Gabriela Lopez and Katrina Bantis, last year to measure the association between “drug” and environment.

In a lab rats, eating Oreos activated more neurons in the brain’s ‘pleasure center’ than exposure to drugs of abuse

On one side of a maze, they would give hungry rats Oreos and on the other, they would give them a control – in this case, rice cakes. Then, they would give the rats the option of spending time on either side of the maze and measure how long they would spend on the side where they were typically fed Oreos.

While it may not be scientifically relevant, Ms Honohan said it was surprising to watch the rats eat the famous cookie. “They would break it open and eat the middle first,” she said.

In contrast, the lab rats didn’t have a taste for the rice cakes. “Just like humans, rats don’t seem to get much pleasure out of eating them,” Schroeder said.

They compared the results of the Oreo and rice cake test with results from rats that were given an injection of cocaine or mNike Ambassador 11