Perhaps in any friend group there is a kid who is called a chili-eating saint. While you can’t swallow a single drop of tabasco, these people are ready to bite the pepper in half and chew it deliciously.
There are even people who like to eat spicy food so much that in their bowl of dipping sauce, chili and pepper are more than fish sauce, dark red in color.
Spicy foods also cause excitement.
According to Robin Andrews – a scientist in London, his friend once shared that chili gives him a very indescribable feeling, in short… lightheaded and “high” like when using alcohol and drugs. so stimulating.
If so, it turns out that spicy food also has a euphoric effect? Is this the cause?
Chili is an important spice in human cuisine. However, for biologists, it is somewhat confusing for humans to eat it, because the evolutionary mechanism of chili peppers is so that animals do not eat them .
Peppers evolved to not be eaten, but humans still eat them.
For normal fruits, it is through feeding and excretion that they can release seeds. But with chili peppers, if eaten by normal animals, almost the entire seed will be destroyed through chewing and swallowing. Therefore, experts believe that chili peppers have a spicy taste so that no animals dare to come close.
Only birds do not destroy the seeds of chili peppers, so they are also frequent eaters of chili peppers in the wild and are the main means of dispersal of seeds for this plant.
People are different, some people like to eat chili, that is, they like the burning sensation that capsaicin (the substance in chili peppers) brings. According to an article on the Per Helix blog from Northwestern University (USA), that feeling can also bring a kind of “get high”.
Chili is an important spice, because it makes people eat “as high as a pangolin”.
The author pointed out that spicy is not the taste, but the body’s response to a protein called TRPV1 found in the tongue. It attaches tightly to nerve cells, with the role of telling the cell what’s going on. TRPV1 has a strong response to temperature. It helps us not to eat too hot, and the same reaction when it encounters capsaicin in chili peppers.
When eating chili, TRPV1 will make the tongue feel burned. And to alleviate this feeling, the brain will release endorphins – a type of neurotransmitter, commonly known as the “happy” hormone . Dopamine – happy hormone is also secreted. The mixture of the two helps the brain feel relaxed, lightheaded, or… “high”.
Eating chili peppers can definitely give you a high, but this euphoria is different from drugs.
Stimulants can cause the brain to produce endorphins, like alcohol and beer. Drugs like molly force the brain to produce dopamine, serotonin (also a form of happiness hormone), and norepinephrine. However, their side effects are very large, so they are almost banned in most countries around the world.
But in short, eating chili can completely make you feel lightheaded, comfortable, or even “high” as some chili addicts say. However, this euphoria is different from drugs. It’s shorter, cheaper, and most importantly, doesn’t damage human nerves.