Obviously! But just in case your personal research and case studies of friends and family (namely, yours truly) did not reveal enough evidence of the addictive properties of ice cream, a study performed by the Oregon Research Institute has confirmed it. Well, sort of. They confirmed the following:
- Teenagers like milkshakes.
- Study participants who ate ice cream the week before the study were less excited about eating ice cream during the study. Researchers associated this with increased cravings yet less derived pleasure associated with repeated drug use.
- The more ice cream you eat, the more ice cream you need to get an ice cream buzz.
- It is unlikely that a person would develop a "full-blown addiction" to ice cream but the addictive properties could lead to overeating and weight gain.
While it was my initial intent to poke fun at this study, I have to admit that I not only crave ice cream - I succumb to those cravings very often. Why? Because I love everything about ice cream! Who doesn't?! I've never come across someone eating ice cream who isn't happy. I don't drink or smoke, I exercise regularly, I eat more vegetables than my garden can grow, but the hard-to-put-in-writing truth is that I have been known to consider a bowl of ice cream a great way to start my day.
However, in response to this study I have decided to give up ice cream for the remainder of the month of March in hopes to determine whether or not I am addicted. I will tweet cravings/confessions as I have them and report back on the topic come April.
In the meantime, there will be a lot more pistachio ice cream available for students on the University or Maryland, College Park campus.
