One glass of this drink will not only make you addicted, but also make you depressed and anxious →

I didn’t get to drink the first cup of milk tea in autumn

The first cup of milk tea in winter

Need to make up?

In recent years

Various types of milk tea are becoming more and more popular

Especially among young people

Whether it's shopping, eating, or working overtime

You must hold a cup of milk tea in your hand first.

Various milk tea shops have sprung up like mushrooms after rain.

However, a recent study from a university found

In addition to the risk of addiction, milk tea

Regular drinking can also increase the risk of depression and anxiety.

Drinking milk tea regularly may lead to addiction and increase the risk of depression and anxiety

Recently, a study published in the Journal of Affective Disorders by researchers from a certain university showed that drinking milk tea may lead to addiction and is associated with depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts.

The researchers analyzed 5,281 college students in my country with an average age of 21 and found that 77% of the participants had drunk at least 6 to 11 cups of milk tea in the past year. Among them, 20.6% drank 2 to 3 cups of milk tea per week, 2.6% drank 4 to 6 cups of milk tea per week, and 1.2% drank 1 cup per day.

Why does milk tea make people happy and addictive?

The reason why milk tea makes people happy starts with our brain. There is a reward system in the brain that makes us feel happy when we do certain things, and this is achieved through a neurotransmitter called dopamine.

When a person or animal satisfies their hunger, neurons in specific areas of the brain are activated, secreting dopamine that is released into the nucleus accumbens, making us happy and wanting to experience that pleasure again.

Delicious food can also activate the brain's reward system, increase the release of dopamine, and make the body feel satisfied and happy, thus becoming addictive.

Sweets and fats are especially so, as they can activate the central nervous system, stimulate the production of dopamine, give people a sense of satisfaction and pleasure, and can also become addictive. Milk tea is just like this, because the brain's desire for happiness will make you want to order a cup of milk tea no matter what.

In addition, many milk teas also contain a little caffeine, which can also make people feel energetic for a while, and make people feel that drinking milk tea is very refreshing and can't stop.

Seven major damages caused by long-term drinking of milk tea to the body

01

Accelerated aging

Milk tea is sweet and delicious, but drinking tons of it every day may age your skin. This is because sugar will eventually be broken down into glucose in the body before it can be used by the body.

If too much sugar is added to food, the excess glucose produced will more easily react with proteins, amino acids or lipids to produce advanced glycation end products (AGES). AGES can glycate collagen and elastin and accelerate skin aging.

02

Acne

Most milk teas have a high sugar content, which may cause and aggravate acne. Even sugar-free milk tea may still contain a lot of sugar.

In March 2023, a local Consumer Rights Protection Committee conducted a comparative test on some milk tea products sold on the market, and collected 33 batches of samples, all from brands that are frequently purchased on the market.

After testing, the sugar content in these samples ranged from 2.9 to 11.4 grams per 100 grams; the average sugar content of milk tea without additional sugar was 3.97 grams per 100 grams, and the average total sugar content of full-sugar milk tea was 7.53 grams per 100 grams.

03

Dental caries

If you do not rinse your mouth immediately after drinking milk tea, the sugar in it will provide a "comfortable" growth and reproduction environment for the bacteria in your mouth. The bacteria and sugar will work together to gradually "break down" your teeth, eventually causing tooth decay.

By then, many delicious foods can only be seen.

04

obesity

Milk tea is high in calories, so drinking it often will naturally make you gain weight. However, in addition to the calorie problem, there is another reason why milk tea makes people gain weight.

Fructose is commonly found in milk tea, and sucrose also releases fructose after digestion. A foreign animal study found that the fur of mice fed a fructose-containing diet was 25% to 40% longer than that of mice not fed fructose, which also increased the weight of the mice.

The reason is that fructose can increase the survival rate of intestinal cells and increase the length of intestinal villi. As the length of villi increases, the surface area of ​​the intestine also expands, increasing the nutrient absorption and fat content of high-fat foods.

05

Cardiovascular disease

The non-dairy creamer in milk tea contains trans fatty acids. Excessive intake of trans fatty acids will increase the risk of cardiovascular disease.

06

gout

The fructose ingested from drinking milk tea can also promote the production of uric acid. Excessive sugar intake may also cause insulin resistance, indirectly reducing the excretion of uric acid and increasing the risk of gout attacks.

07

Insomnia

The caffeine content of milk tea is not low. Some researchers have tested the caffeine content of commercially available milk tea. The caffeine content of 42 milk tea samples varied greatly, with the difference between the highest and lowest content exceeding 10 times, ranging from 2.57 to 27.90 mg/100 g, and the average value was 11.8 mg/100 g.
That is to say, drinking a 450 ml cup of milk tea may result in the intake of 53.1 mg of caffeine, which is almost equivalent to 2 small packets of instant coffee.

Caffeine can refresh the mind, especially at night, it will make people sleepy and difficult to fall asleep. For example, if I have a cup of milk tea at night, I may not fall asleep until 3 o'clock in the morning.

References

①New form of addiction: An emerging hazardous addiction problem of milk tea among youths https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2023.08.102

②2023-05-22 Popular Science China "I feel uncomfortable if I don't drink it for a day! Milk tea is delicious and addictive, but do you know these "seven sins"? "

③ Sun Liuling, Chen Wei, He Yuxiu. Midbrain ventral tegmental area-nucleus accumbens dopaminergic pathway and obesity [C]//Chinese Physiological Society Sports Physiology Committee, Beijing Sport University. Proceedings of the 2018 Chinese Physiological Society Sports Physiology Committee Meeting and the Academic Seminar on "Science and Technology Innovation and Sports Physiology". [Publisher unknown], 2018: 301-302.