' The Extraordinary Science Of Addictive Junk Food?

Improved Essays
Big Name Companies and the Tending Addiction of Processed Food
“The Extraordinary Science of Addictive Junk Food”, an expert from The New York Times Magazine, by Michael Moss addresses many issues with big companies and their thought process. Although Moss neglects to show the things that companies do right or do because the consumer desires it. He doesn’t bring to light the different options that big companies put out that are healthier for the consumer. Moss does a good job of pointing out what he believes to be the short coming of big companies towards their consumers. Are big food companies meeting our needs or creating them for us? Should they have to set limits between meeting our genuine needs and making a profit for themselves? Moss’s
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When looking at consumer’s choices, two of the concerns are ease of use and time. Drane specifically points out that mothers are arguably the main shoppers when it comes to food, as trying to find ways to keep the family fed and be time efficient. The faster pace that consumer’s live by today is not taken into consideration when looking at Moss’s article. Consumers have become more stagnant in their lives. Life styles are no longer active, everything has become automated. Exercise is now a luxury and not a necessity. Consumers no longer look at the labels to see what nutrition benefits are in the food they are buying, they are more concerned about price and time. I’m a prime example of this, when at the grocery store I look for what is quick and easy over what is healthier for …show more content…
Sensory-specific satiety refers to overwhelming flavors of foods that confuse the consumer’s brain into thinking they want more or need to keep eating more. This brings us to the topic of are big food companies meeting our needs or creating them for us? From personal experience of watching my grandma make everything from scratch, I believe big companies such as, General Mills, Oscar Mayer, and many others are creating needs for us. Before reading Moss’s article I never would have assumed that Prego spaghetti sauce has two teaspoons of sugar per serving or that lunchables have “[…] as many as nine grams of saturated fat, or nearly an entire day’s recommended maximum for kids, with up to two-thirds of the max of sodium and 13 teaspoons of sugar” (section 2). Do these products really need this much sugar to make them taste good? Personally, I don’t believe so, I feel that in adding a continual stream of additive and extra sugar to create both a desire and craving for these foods is only making more sales and money for big companies. If Sanger is right people will still buy the foods they like even without all that added sugar and

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