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Human HyperFormance Newsletters>
Where calorie cutting doesn’t work – Part 1
June 19, 2008
Artificial sweeteners may carry more baggage than possible side effects due to their chemistry. A study at the University of California, San Diego found that women drinking water sweetened with either sugar (sucrose) or Splenda both produced activity in the taste and pleasure centers in the brain. The sugar activated the pleasure areas more, while the Splenda produced more activity in regions connecting reward system processing. Lead author psychiatrist Guido Frank suggests that Splenda activates the reward system but doesn’t satisfy it. “Our hypothesis is that Splenda has less of a feedback mechanism to stop the craving, to get satisfied.”
Studies have shown that drinking diet soda increases obesity and elevates cardiovascular and metabolic disease risk. Frank’s study may show the mechanism: a degraded ability to track calorie consumption.
Of course, refined sugar is no health food either. One good substitute is xylitol, a naturally occurring sugar with one third the calories of sucrose and a glycemic index of 7, as opposed to sucrose’s 100. The glycemic index is a measure of how quickly carbohydrates raise blood sugar – higher is worse. Even better, xylitol prevents cavities (which is why they used to put it in “sugarless” gum, until artificial sweeteners became cheaper)! And xylitol tastes like…sugar.
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