Rats Addicted to Junk Food
I read how rats can actually become addicted to junk food. The behavior of the rats was very close to the rats that were addicted to drugs. They just kept eating more and more food, eventually they became obese. The rats eating the junk food were taking in twice the amount of calories as the controlled rats. The researchers did a test by shocking the rats everytime they would eat the high-fat-food, but they still kept eating even though they knew they were going to get shocked. They couldn’t stop. Eventually they took their food away and only gave them food that was good for them, but they wouldnt eat they just starved themselves for two weeks. The long term affects are unknown, but the dietary preferences are shifted.
The author of the article was Laura Sanders and the web edition was published October 21st, 2009.
What are your thoughts on rats being addicted to junk food?
How do you feel about rats being tested?
13 Responses to “Rats Addicted to Junk Food”
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this explains a lot of things about why rats wont leave suburban areas. While eating all this junk food they, just like us, have become addicted to it. I’m not saying that if we switched diets the rats will just leave us alone, but I believe the junk food is one of the reasons why they keep coming back for more.
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Wow. who knew that even rats could get addicted to junk food. That shows just how bad junk food is for us, and that we need to eat health food. Eating junk food all the time isn’t even good for animals. It’s just another type of drug it seems like. Honestly, I think it’s ok for humans to test things on rats, because if we don’t test things on animals who are we going to test things on? If we don’t test on animals we may never know some things. But then again animals don’t deserve it.
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I think that its really interesting to know that rats can become addictted to junk food just has humans can. I think it is wrong to test anything on animals and that this is another experiment that should not test anymore on rats or any other animals.
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Rats being addicted to junk food is new for me. I haven’t heard of that before and it is very wierd.
I can’t believe junk food plays the same affect on rats as drugs do to humans. I think testing rats is ok if none of them are hurt in doing it. I don’t know how I feel about this experiment on rats though.
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I think that it is very possible for rats to be addicted to junkfood. I know some people who crave junkfood and who have to have junkfood everyday to feel good. But I don’t think it is right or humane to make these rats addicted to something to where they cannot help themselves and then just shock them to see what their reaction is.
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Great…so not only do we have obesity in America, but we need it in animals too?? I think that the way people eat can affect their pets as well. Many people share “snacks” with their pets, so of course our food choices affect the diets of our pets.
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My thoughts on rats being addicted to junk food is that those rats are like humans. We become addicted to junk food and just like the rats…we can’t stop!! I think that the rats should not be tested if it will harm them. If they are being put at risk then no it’s not humane for them to have to go through that.
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Well rats are a good test subject for many things. Addictions go the same way, for most animals. If all you feed your dog is McDonald’s Happy Meals, then randomly switch him to normal dog food, it’s gonna whine and pout about not getting the high fat and caloric Happy Meal. Same with a human. Addict him/her to really anything, and he/she is gonna have a hard time getting off it.
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I think that rats are a good way to test things. I think that if it can help people understands things or help save people in some cases then it is a good idea. Not very many people like them and im not quite sure what good they are anyways.
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I think that rats are good things to test on. There are plenty of them, and they tend to react pretty much the same way we do to things. They are good test subjects. I don’t really see a problem with it, but I know that there are a lot of people who would strongly disagree with that.
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I don’t really like rats and I don’t think there life is more important to intelligent life. I think that the rats should still be tested on for important purposes such as life taking experiments, but not for just junk food.
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Wow rats addicted to junk food? I never saw that one coming.. :) well for starters that really shows how bad the food we all eat is for us. I think rats might have to start being tested more often.
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I think that rate should not be tested on just because their do not really matter to the rest off the world. But i do think that its interesting that rats can get addicted to fating food and would prefer to stave then to eat regular food for rats.
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