It’s no secret that processed foods like potatoes, cookies and chocolate are easy to overeat. In fact, they’re often designed to be immune, a scientist who worked with UPF companies told Business Insider. She shared two amazing UPF styles to make us crave them.
Professor Barry Smith, an experienced nutrition expert based at the Center for Psychology at the University of London, has worked with companies such as Kellogg’s, Coca-Cola and Ferrero. At first, companies came to him asking how they could reduce the salt and sugar in their products without ruining the taste.
But over time, Smith said companies became interested in improving foods to make them irresistible to the point where people feel they can’t stop eating them. “And I thought, wait, it’s not the same message that we want to make healthy food,” he said.
Smith decided to stop communicating with UPFs for ethical reasons and cut them out of his diet completely because of the health risks. They have been linked to many health problems including type 2 diabetes, heart disease, some cancers and depression.
UPFs are foods that contain ingredients that you cannot find in a regular kitchen, and are made using industrial methods. They are hyperpalatable, shelf-stable, and highly marketable.
Before you eat UPF, you already have dopamine, the happy hormone, Smith said.
“If you’re walking down a grocery aisle and you see all these sweet packages, that’s when the dopamine goes up, not when you’re actually eating the thing,” he said.
And not only how it looks is important. UPF companies take advantage of all the power of the senses to draw people to their products.
“There’s the look, the smell, and sometimes the sound of it,” he said.
Companies use what is called sonic branding
You might be surprised to learn that the satisfying click of a soda can when opened, the quick crack you hear when a chocolate bar is broken in half, or the rustle of a bag of chips, are often intentional. .
That’s because sonic branding, or connecting a sound to a product, can make us want to use it, Smith said. “All that prepares you for what’s to come, and encourages you to look forward and desire,” he said.
He talked about the slurping sound a Snapple bottle makes when you open it, or the snapping and tearing of a Coca-Cola can.
“If you’re listening to someone open a can of Coke, you might think, ‘Ooh, yeah, I want a can of Coke,'” he said.
How chocolate feels when broken can be engineered. Capelle.r/Getty Images
Much of what we taste comes from our sense of smell
Much of what we think of as taste actually comes from our sense of smell. Scientists have estimated that smell may be responsible for about 75 to 95% of what we taste.
So, just like sound, companies use our sense of smell to grab our attention and make us want their products. For example, a grocery store might emit a baking aroma to encourage customers to buy baked goods, even if they’re shopping for vegetables, Smith said.
He also shared a “new ad” that Mars used for its ice cream bars. The company decided to put the ribs at the end of the package with chocolate and caramel flavors since the frozen items are odorless, he said.
He said: “You tear it open and you have a caramel and chocolate smell so it smells like having a Mars bar.” “I think it’s very clever and very interesting.”
Smith makes a distinction between directing customers to a product, which he thinks is acceptable, and turning them away, which he disagrees with.
“If you lead someone to a product by reminding them of what’s in it and those ingredients are actually in the product, then you’re leading them by giving them a sense of emotion or anticipation of what’s next,” he said. But if you give them a hint of something that’s not there, then you’re misleading them, he said.
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