Sugary Drinks Make You Crave More Calories, Study Shows

An apple a day keeps the doctor away, and just two sugary drinks can have the opposite effect.

According to the Guardian, UK researchers are suggesting that two sugary drinks a day can dull your taste buds, which leads to a "dulled sensitivity to sweet tastes." This, in turn, can cause people to seek out high-calorie, sweet snacks.

"As the sweet 'treat' becomes less rewarding, so people tend to look for more sweet food to drink, and a vicious circle of eating sweet and calorie-laden food is established," a press release describing the study explained.

Perhaps even more notable is that the researchers concluded that it doesn't take long for the sweet beverages to have an effect. The researchers found that by drinking two sugary drinks per day for four weeks, people could dramatically change how they taste and thus, their eating habits.

And not for the better.

"From our research, it is clear to see how this situation may have created a cycle of sweet food and drink consumption," Dr. Hans-Peter Kubis, one of the study's authors said in a statement. "As taste satisfaction levels drop; the more sweet foods are consumed, contributing to these problems."

This is just the latest in bad press for sugary libations, which have been blamed for everything from damaging teeth to increasing blood pressure.

Comments

[The Revolving Diet]

03:05 PM on 06/13/2011

I personally like regular soda, only I drink it on very rare occasions. Diet soda tastes awful and gives me headaches...

This weeks diet I am doing is "FAT to Skinny" - Fast and Easy. per the author Doug Varrieur - SUGAR is what is making us FAT....check out info on diet (if you are interested - therevolvingdiet.com)

[Folk Hero]

02:49 PM on 06/13/2011

I am southern, and we love soda. I decided to give up soda a few years ago. It was almost as hard as giving up smoking. Now I don't miss soda at all. I always drink water in a stainless steel container. I carry it everywhere with me. Soda is not good for you at all. If you can't quit, consider cutting down.

[SheDAISY]

11:21 AM on 06/13/2011

**Slightly off Topic (related to some soft drinks)

"Most people have never heard of BVO-brominated vegetable oil-yet it’s highly toxic and found in many products we consume in large quantities. Used as an emulsifier and clouding agent in soft drinks such as Mountain Dew, Gatorade, Powerade, some Gatorade, Pineapple and Orange Fanta, Orange Crush, Sun Drop, Squirt and Fresca, BVO can also be found in some bakery products and brands of pasta.

BVO has been banned in over 100 countries. In the U.S. it’s use is regulated by the FDA to the extent that it is “PERMITTED IN FOOD OR IN CONTACT WITH FOOD ON AN INTERIM BASIS PENDING ADDITIONAL STUDY.” (http://vm.cfsan.fda.gov/~lrd/fcf180.html)"

http://fooddemocracy.wordpress.com/2009/07/29/bvo-brominated-vegetable-oil-toxic-additive-in-many-sports-drinks-and-sodas/

[WaveRhydr]

01:44 PM on 06/14/2011

Thanks, Daisy. I had never heard of that stuff. Im drinking a Mtn Dew throwback (real sugar, not HFCS), and sure enough, BVO is in it. Sigh.

[ILoveGreatDanes]

10:14 AM on 06/13/2011

I don't drink any drinks with sugar, or eat hardly any sugar at all. I drink Diet Root Beer or Diet Dr. Pepper, unsweetened tea with Sweet 'n' Low, Crystal Light, and lots of water. Whenever I taste a regular Coke, it tastes like I'm drinking a 10 lb bag of sugar compressed in a 12 oz. can. Yuck! It makes my butt expand exponentially with startling rapidity, too.

[Anil Minocha]

12:46 PM on 06/12/2011

Increasing use of sugar containing beverages is in part related to the rising tide of obesity over recent decades. These are source of empty calories and drinking water instead might be better option for health.

[50PlusSam]

03:46 AM on 06/12/2011

...and we in America drink only sodas....Time to give up sugar.
http://www.lifestyle-after50.com/sugar.html

[Jambala99]

07:38 PM on 06/11/2011

Not only that, it can cause kidney stones, diabetes, and a host of other things. Did you know that cancer cells like to feed off of sugar and "corn sugar"?

I have no more than 2 sodas a year and usually it will be a "Coke". I like to buy the "Mexican" bottled coke because they still use real sugar instead of corn syrup (....and I think it tastes better)

[topkatnc]

11:29 PM on 06/12/2011

I stopped drinking soft drinks about four years ago .. Now if I try to drink one , I feel like my mouth is full of sugar ..

[jgarma]

03:02 PM on 06/11/2011

Yep, more insights into the insidious nature of soda.

I watch my seven-year old niece's behavior around food/drink. She gets more than her fair share of fast carbs, like pizza and pasta, the kind that spike the blood glucose level and can turn quickly into fat.

She also like veggies and fruits, so gets her share of that, and is super active, so, so far, she's lean. But I wonder how her propensity for fast carbs will effect her later in life, particularly her preferred drink choices.

"Why don't you just drink some filtered water?", I ask her as she implores her mother for any drink that's colored and flavored. She looks at me like I'm daft. Fortunately, her mom holds her ground when it comes to soda.

If you or your kids drink soda, at least get apprised about what you're doing. "One Soda, Lotsa Harm" describes your body's response every 10 minutes or so after one regular-size serving of soda: http://wp.me/pA04z-xU

[rda1911a1]

08:12 PM on 06/10/2011

Has Michael Moore read this?

[michael medeiros]

04:42 PM on 06/10/2011

This is just another indication of how bad these drinks are for us. The high sugar content, empty calories, and other junk in these drinks can eventually lead to many health problems.
http://exerciseandnutritiontips.com

[redbud9]

04:04 PM on 06/10/2011

Two years ago I gave up sodas and other sugary drinks. Best thing I ever did, to say nothing of the money I've saved.

[stepheniegwen]

03:15 PM on 06/10/2011

This is interesting. I used to drink Dr. Pepper like it was going out of style. After stopping all soda cold-turkey, I began noticing (after some months) that I tasted things differently. In fact, I had a Dr. Pepper recently and it was WAY sweeter than I remember. Makes sense now!

[jgarma]

03:07 PM on 06/11/2011

Taste buds are malleable.

I wish people understood that better. Just because you like the taste of something, doesn't mean you have to keep eating it, even if it's bad for you, as if you can't train your buds to appreciate something better that right now isn't so savory.

Try to look at food as fuel, instead of a drug to achieve some emotional gratification. No one would poor sugar into their car's fuel tank. Why is the car more important than one's body?

[bracken]

02:50 PM on 06/10/2011

Sugar consumption triggers dopamine responses in the brain. It's an addictive substance. There are studies that confirm this. It's partly physiological, partly psychological. You can raise your insulin levels just anticipating a sugary drink.

[bracken]

02:42 PM on 06/10/2011

It's not the sweet taste or the "dulling of the tastebuds." It's the sugar that spikes insulin, causes a dramatic drop in blood glucose in a short time, and thereby creates hunger. Duh. This whole "dulling of the tastebuds" is a ploy to dance around the fact that (no matter what Katz or Ornish say) it's CARBOHYDRATES that make you hungry.

[jgarma]

03:10 PM on 06/11/2011

Not sure what you imply that Katz and Ornish say about carbs, but from what I've read of there stuff, they distiguish between "fast" and "slow" carbs.

The fast carbs have the insulin reaction to which you refer. The slow carbs do not, and thus offer sustained, measured energy.

That said, all things in balance -- it's good to eat macronutirents in balance, and so lean proteins and healthy (omega-3) fatty acids need to be part of the mix.

[bracken]

10:10 AM on 06/12/2011

They have their "healthy whole grains" obsession to promulgate, so of course they're going to split hairs about good carbs (slow) versus bad carbs (fast).

In the first place, the body can create all the energy it needs from protein and fat. It does not NEED carbohydrates. If carbohydrates are available, it will burn them first, and then burn fat or protein for energy. This is a healthy process.

Carbohydrates, complex or not, are just sugar. If you eat a lot of them, you will store them as fat. Most people eat far more than they need for energy, and most people do not use carbohydrates for energy at the level of professional athletes ore marathon runners.

Whole-wheat bread has a higher glycemic index (71)--that is, it enters the bloodstream faster--than pure sucrose or Coca-Cola (58). Rye-Krisps have a glycemic index of 64. Raisins, that great staple of energy bars, granola, and lunchboxes, have an index of 64 and a high glycemic load of 28. A sweet potato has a higher GI than pure sugar. So much for "slow carbs."

Katz and Ornish (along with Oz) are the biggest promoters of vegetarian, carb-heavy diets. The phrase "healthy whole grains" is repeated over and over on TV, print media, websites, and doctor's office. Nothing could be further from the truth.

[bracken]

10:17 AM on 06/12/2011

And rice cakes have a higher glycemic index (78) and higher glycemic load (17) than vanilla wafers (77, 14).

[KC-CAJUN]

01:22 PM on 06/10/2011

Last week it was "diet soft drinks" that cause sugar cravings. Tomorrow it will be bottled water.

[Lolly]

06:53 PM on 06/10/2011

I think they both cause cravings. The body can respond to sweet taste by releasing insulin. So, whether you have the actual sugar or not, the body thinks you have, spikes your insulin, then leaves you craving sugar.

Maybe it doesn't happen to everyone, but it did to me. I used to drink diet soda, then hit the vending machines for whatever sweet stuff I could get my hands on 30-40 minutes later.