Brendan O'Connor Donal O’Shea: “Everything is salted caramel now: it combines salt, fat and sugar.”
Mar 28, 2026
Donal O’Shea, specialist in obesity and academic clinician, explores how modern food is engineered for cravings. He discusses ultra-processed foods, palatability tricks like combining salt, fat and sugar, and pervasive marketing that targets kids. Policy solutions and personal strategies to navigate this environment are also covered.
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Fat Sugar And Salt Trip The Brain's Fullness Signals
- Combining fat, sugar and salt creates a palatability that overrides fullness signals and triggers more-ish eating.
- Products are engineered to hit age-specific 'bliss points' so children, teens and adults keep eating beyond satiety.
Marketing Tactics Turn Seasonal Treats Into Impulse Frenzies
- Retail placement and promotional tactics escalate impulse buying: early displays, mile‑high stacks, 'no more than five per customer' signs and prize offers.
- Win offers triple purchase likelihood and multi-buy deals push people to buy larger quantities cheaply.
Devices Replace TV As Kids' Main Source Of Food Advertising
- Mobile devices expose children to many rapid ads for ultra-processed 'food‑products', bypassing traditional broadcast rules and the watershed.
- Under‑15s get virtually no mainstream broadcast media, making device-based advertising the main vector.