Dr. Bart Hoebel, a professor at Princeton University, believes that sugar provokes the brain to undergo similar reactions to those when the brain becomes addicted to hard drugs, such as cocaine and heroin.
“Drinking large amounts of sugar water when hungry can cause behavioral changes and even neurochemical changes in the brain which resemble changes that are produced when animals or people take substances of abuse. These animals show signs of withdrawal and even long-lasting effects that might resemble craving,” Hoebel stated.
For this study, researchers deprived rats of food for 12 hours daily, then fed them with foods containing glucose and sucrose.
While consuming the foods, researchers observed an increase of dopamine in the brain. This amino acid often plays a major neurological role in drug addiction.