Pleasure Principle
Do you eat more in the cold weather? I seem to and can't really help myself. Do you consume more snacks and junk food when the winter is in its thick? That certainly seems to be the case for me. All summer long I dined on salads and small slices of bread thinly lacquered with peanut butter. I shunned cookies and chocolate of virtually every sort. It wasn't much of a struggle at all. Warm weather and sunshine seem to suppress my appetite. This must be a scientifically measurable phenomenon.
I was going strong until the sun started to set way too early and the temperature began to drop. Suddenly I was overcome by cravings I found myself unable to resist.
Is this something that has been studied? Because it feels like it ought to be. The relationship to mood and weather is already accepted. So the relationship between eating habits and weather seems a logical subdivision.
Perhaps some survival mechanism in the brain still subtly convinces us to gorge for fear that we'll freeze or starve. There is still evolution present in our behavior. Otherwise we'd never have sex.
Food is a very baseline, most primal need. That's why it trips us up so much. We have to eat. We can't quit. Every cell in our bodies craves nourishment. Our brain chemistry is such that we are rewarded with pleasure sensation for a meal.
Most people derive pleasure from so many other sources that the food ones aren't that relevant. An endorphin here. Some dopamine there. Who's counting anyway?
But some of us lack the ability to fully process or produce all the pleasurable hormones our brains are designed to produce. For some of us food pleasure is extremely addictive. like cocaine. only more fattening.
I was going strong until the sun started to set way too early and the temperature began to drop. Suddenly I was overcome by cravings I found myself unable to resist.
Is this something that has been studied? Because it feels like it ought to be. The relationship to mood and weather is already accepted. So the relationship between eating habits and weather seems a logical subdivision.
Perhaps some survival mechanism in the brain still subtly convinces us to gorge for fear that we'll freeze or starve. There is still evolution present in our behavior. Otherwise we'd never have sex.
Food is a very baseline, most primal need. That's why it trips us up so much. We have to eat. We can't quit. Every cell in our bodies craves nourishment. Our brain chemistry is such that we are rewarded with pleasure sensation for a meal.
Most people derive pleasure from so many other sources that the food ones aren't that relevant. An endorphin here. Some dopamine there. Who's counting anyway?
But some of us lack the ability to fully process or produce all the pleasurable hormones our brains are designed to produce. For some of us food pleasure is extremely addictive. like cocaine. only more fattening.
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