Hooked: How Processed Food Became Addictive

by Michael Moss

A year earlier, the company’s new CEO, Indra Nooyi, who had foreseen the decade’s steep decline in soda drinking, launched an initiative called the Big Bet, in which the entire lineup of PepsiCo products would be examined for opportunities to make them healthier or develop spin-offs that could fit that bill. “She seemed so enlightened,”41 said Small, who was starstruck when she heard Nooyi speak. “She was like, ‘We need to get ahead of this. Winter is coming. We need to figure it out.’ That’s why I was so on board. I saw this as the only way we’re going to solve this, by partnering with industry, because its resources are so enormous.” Moreover, Small’s research center had safeguards in place to avoid any meddling by benefactors and partners, such as retaining the final say on publishing the research. The money from PepsiCo that would pay for her work could be controlled. She also saw the company’s interest in brain scans as a good sign. This was something that, from the company’s perspective, could backfire if word got out with the spin that it was using these scans to peer into our heads for its commercial gain. PepsiCo attorneys and other officials met to discuss the ethics in using the fMRI to develop new products. “There was a small concern about getting people addicted to our products,” recalled Flammer. But the company decided this risk was worth it. “Would it be kosher to use neuroscience?” Derek Yach, PepsiCo’s senior vice president for global health and agricultu...