Welcome to the continuing diary series "Let's Read a WHEE Book Together!" This week, we're continuing (for a little while) with David Kessler's The End of Overeating, Chapter 47. If you're just discovering this diary series, you will find links to the previous installments at the bottom of this diary.
WHEE (Weight, Health, Eating and Exercise) is a community support diary for Kossacks who are currently or planning to start losing, gaining or maintaining their weight through diet and exercise or fitness. Any supportive comments, suggestions or positive distractions are appreciated. If you are working on your weight or fitness, please -- join us! You can also click the WHEE tag to view all diary posts.
The End of Overeating, by David Kessler, M.D.
Chapter 47: Industry Cracks the Code
In the next-to-last chapter of the book, Kessler continues to look back at the food industry. The first food industry titan he talks to is introduced as the "award-winning chef-owner of Chinois on Main," Wolfgang Puck. If you think a celebrity chef couldn't have much effect outside of his own one or two high-priced restaurants, then you don't know Puck. According to Wikipedia,
The Wolfgang Puck Companies encompasses over 20 fine dining restaurants, premium catering services, more than 80 Wolfgang Puck Express operations, and kitchen and food merchandise, including cookbooks and canned foods.
If you've traveled through a major American airport, you've probably seen a Wolfgang Puck Express. And if you've traveled down the center aisles of an ordinary supermarket, you've probably seen Wolfgang Puck Soups.
Happily for Kessler, Puck agrees with him as to the main cause of American overeating: sugar, fat and salt. As for the large portions served in American restaurants (including Kessler's meal in Chinois), Puck admits that larger servings were not the result of customer demand, but rather originated with the food industry. In fact, according to Puck, finishing all of the larger portions was a habit that took a number of experiences to establish:
The first time, people didn't eat it. The second time, they didn't eat it. The third time, they ate it.
After talking to Wolfgang Puck, Kessler brings on economist Joseph Stiglitz, who asserts that the food industry isn't trying to make us EAT more, just BUY more. The researcher is followed by a research chef for the Chili's restaurant chain, who admits that their goal is to keep us coming back for more. There's nothing here that wasn't said at greater length earlier in the book. Bringing these guys on near the end of the book to repeat earlier riffs is something like a rock star introducing his sidemen near the end of a concert - except that Kessler is more concerned with adding a bit more emphasis to his thesis than giving Wolfgang Puck and the Chili's research chef a bit of recognition.
That thesis, of course, is that sugar, fat, and salt make food "superstimulating" (Chapter 47's version of "hyperpalatable"). But according to Kessler, food industry marketers go beyond the "addictive" properties of the food itself, and "layer" it with:
- positive perceptions,
- good feelings, and
- cues that make us seek out their associated rewards.
It's this combination of "superstimulating" food reinforced by marketing that has enabled the food industry to "crack the code" of conditioned hypereating (thus the chapter title). Kessler asserts that the industry has "...learned exactly how to manipulate our eating behavior." He then sets up the last chapter by saying:
Our challenge is to figure out how to respond.
Previous chapters from The End of Overeating:
Part 6: The End of Overeating
Chapter 46: "Our Success Is the Problem" (reviewed by Clio2)
Part 5: Food Rehab
Chapter 45: Making the Critical Perceptual Shift (reviewed by me)
Chapter 44: Avoiding Traps: On Obsession and Release (reviewed by Clio2)
Chapter 43: Eating Is Personal (reviewed by me)
Chapter 42: Letting Go of the Past (reviewed by Clio2)
Chapter 41: Planned Eating (reviewed by me)
Chapter 40: The Treatment Framework (reviewed by Clio2)
Part 4: The Theory of Treatment
Chapter 39: Emotional Learning (reviewed by me)
(there are links to chapters 36 through 38 in my Chapter 39 review)
Part 3: Conditioned Hypereating Emerges
Chapter 35: The Culture of Overeating (reviewed by me)
(there are links to Chapters 27 through 34 in my Chapter 35 review)
Part 2: The Food Industry
Chapter 26: Purple Cows (reviewed by Clio2)
Chapter 25: The Science of Selling (there are links to Chapters 14 through 24 in my Chapter 25 review)
Part 1: Sugar, Fat, and Salt
Chapter 13: Eating Behavior Becomes a Habit (reviewed by me)
(there are links to Chapters 1 through 12 in my Chapter 13 review)
Scheduled WHEE diary
Feb. 7
Sun AM - ???
Sun PM - debbieleft
Feb. 8
Mon AM - NC Dem (weekly diary)
Mon PM - ???
Feb. 9
Tues AM - ???
Tues PM - Clio2 (Kessler, Ch. 48) (if weather permits)
Feb. 10
Weds AM - ???
Weds PM - Edward Spurlock (weekly diary)
Feb. 11
Thurs AM - ???
Thurs PM - ???
Feb. 12
Fri AM - ???
Fri PM - Wee Mama (weekly diary)
Feb. 13
Sat AM - ???
Sat PM - Edward Spurlock (weekly diary)