For the whole story, you can click on the link. The important thing is that people can be "trained" to yearn for peanut butter and ice cream by associating these items with fractal images. I, personally, have trained myself to yearn for beer, simply by associating beer with the act of breathing.

In the study mentioned below, participants were also trained to bark loudly and drool when promised chocolate, but this information was supressed.


Humans trained to hunger like Pavlov's dogs

19:00 21 August 03

NewScientist.com news service


Humans can be trained to crave food in response to abstract prompts just like Pavlov's dogs, reveals new research.

But whereas Pavlov's dogs were conditioned to drool at the sound of a bell, Jay Gottfried and colleagues at University College London, UK, trained humans to yearn for vanilla ice cream and peanut butter at the sight of fractal-based computer images.

Importantly, the team also showed that the human brain can put a "brake" on the powerful desire for certain foods once the appetite has been sated. This system to turn the "delectable into the distasteful" may be crucial in regulating behaviour, they say. Detecting faults in this system might in future help shed light on compulsive eating disorders and substance addictions, speculates Gottfried, a neurologist.

"If food cravings in general are being triggered by environmental cues associated with food, [compulsive eaters] could have a disturbance in the way the brain puts a brake on the system," he told New Scientist.