Hi, Eve and a BUMP all round for this topic.
Don't know if you are still out there Eve, and not sure i can summarise this very comprehensive book. I'll try... Umm, so, very briefly:
Kessler's books divides into sections:
First a description of the brain chemistry at work as we think about and eat food. This includes the dopamine circuitry, the role of serotonin, the opiate circuitry and others. It explains how these various functions, which all have a valuable evolutionary role, have in many cases been disrupted by modern western lifestyles, including the constant availability of food, the social role of food and, perhaps above all, the kind of food that is now available to us.
The next section describes how the food industry exploits these functions and has learnt to highly process food and to layer it with sugar, fat and salt in combinations which many are almost helpless to resist. There are some almost enjoyably grotesque descriptions of what really goes into the most seductive fast food.
Kessler then describes what he calls "conditioned hypereating". This is a phenomenon which he believes has emerged in many, many of us as a result of the coming together of our neurochemistry with the Western food industry. (His description exactly sums up my relationship with food). He stops short of calling this an illness but he makes a plea for it to be taken very seriously as he sees it as the key to a great deal of the obesity epidemic in the West.
I found it wonderful to see my behaviour described with real sympathy and understanding (he says that he is a conditioned hypereater himself, albeit a largely reformed one), but with a very pragmatic approach to treatment.
Te final section (which i am in the middle of) sets out the guidelines for self-treatment. I think these are probably rather similar to treatment plans for many other compulsive behaviours.
Kessler is a senior academic and throughout the book his claims are backed up with endless references to serious and well-regarded research. It is definitely not a pappy self-help con, but a serious piece of research and analysis.
Phew! So anyone tempted to read it?