
chocolate: a consuming passion?
So it isn't programmed it was genetically, but it is the next best thing – we can't help our addiction to chocolate!
I don't know why this has come to the surface just now (work was published in 2007, but it appeared in my Google News feed this morning) but here's a piece of research that shows we develop cravings for chocolate because of bacteria in our gut.
http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2007/10/12/chocolate-craving-hea.html?category=health&guid=20071012140000&dcitc=w19-506-ak-0004
it opens up the possibility that bacteria may be responsible for other cravings as well –I heard somewhere that an aversion therapy for alcoholics is to place microbes in their gut that cause them to be violently sick in the presence of alcohol, and perhaps something that is the "full"responseat an earlier stage will work for people with eating disorders?
Incidentally, that first quote above: