It’s 3:27 PM. You’re halfway through an email, and there it is—the urge.
Chocolate. Maybe a muffin.
Possibly both.
But here’s the truth that might surprise you: your craving isn’t a nutritional emergency.
It’s more likely a psychological reflex.
According to psychologist Eva Kemps from Flinders University in Adelaide, chocolate doesn’t even crack the top of magnesium-rich foods.
“Funnily enough, people don’t crave spinach,” she told BBC Future.
Spinach, almonds, and even pumpkin seeds contain more magnesium.
So why doesn’t your brain dream of kale?
Because cravings aren’t logical.
They’re not even particularly biological.
They’re memory.
Emotion.
Association.
A feedback loop fueled by feelings, not deficiencies.
And when you look closely, they reveal more about your mood than your mineral levels.
A Deeper Dive Into the Psychology of Craving
Cravings have always masqueraded as intuitive nutrition.
The popular belief?
If you’re craving something, your body is whispering its needs.
Pregnant and dreaming of pickles?
Must be a sodium shortfall.
Can’t function without your daily flat white?
Maybe your brain’s crying for caffeine.
But that idea doesn’t really hold up to scientific scrutiny.
While rare medical conditions—like pica, where people crave non-food items like ice or dirt—can be linked to nutrient deficiencies, the vast majority of our cravings aren’t rooted in biology.
Instead, they’re often triggered by mood, memory, and environment.
“For emotional eaters… it’s more about being bored, anxious, stressed, or lonely and needing to eat something nice to feel better,” Kemps explained to the ABC.
That means your 3PM sugar hit might be less about low blood sugar and more about low workplace morale.
The Brain, the Eyes, and the Hunger for Food Fantasies
Here’s where things get fascinating.
Kemps and her research partner, Marika Tiggemann, decided to figure out exactly how cravings form—and how they might be disrupted.
They asked 130 participants about their food cravings and tracked the role of sensory input. The most surprising insight?
Visual imagery was king.
More powerful than smell or touch, what you see (or mentally picture) drives how badly you want that gooey brownie.
“It’s all about the mental movie,” says Kemps.
That explains why cravings hit harder after scrolling food reels or binge-watching cooking shows.
And then, the duo made a discovery that feels almost sci-fi: if you hijack that mental imagery, you can dull the craving.
Even something as mundane as staring at TV static or playing Tetris could short-circuit your brain’s craving loop.
“The visual interference should give you an opportunity to reduce any sort of imagery you might have from the food that you are wanting or craving,” Kemps told reporters.
Your Body Is Not That Smart
Let’s pause here and challenge the core belief many of us hold: Your body knows what it needs, and cravings are its way of telling you.
That’s not just wrong—it’s potentially harmful.
If your body were such a sharp diagnostician, it wouldn’t crave cookies over leafy greens.
It wouldn’t send you on a late-night drive for fries instead of folate.
And if it was really low on magnesium, it would nudge you toward foods that actually contain a lot of it.
This popular narrative romanticizes cravings as sacred inner wisdom.
But the truth is more uncomfortable—and freeing.
Most cravings are just neural habits tied to feelings.
You crave cookies at night not because you’re deficient in glucose, but because you’ve taught your brain that sugar is comfort.
This reframing is crucial not just for the average person, but especially for those with disordered eating.
If cravings are merely misunderstood messages, we risk misinterpreting compulsive behavior as biologically justified.
Cravings, Compulsion, and the Fight Against Disordered Eating
For people with conditions like binge eating disorder, cravings can be the first domino in a cascade of self-destructive behaviors.
Overeating, followed by restriction, guilt, purging, or excessive exercise—this is the cycle that Kemps is trying to disrupt.
She believes that visual disruption—through activities like playing games or watching flickering static—could preemptively block the craving from taking root.
“We need to do something to try and help these people cope with their cravings,” she says.
Cravings, for these individuals, aren’t just inconvenient—they’re dangerous.
They initiate a sequence of choices that feel out of control.
Interrupting the craving early—before the brain builds that mental movie of indulgence—could be key to helping people regain agency.
So… Should You Give In?
Here’s the final twist.
Despite spending years researching how to reduce cravings, Kemps isn’t calling for total abstinence.
In fact, her advice is refreshingly human:
“It’s actually better to let yourself have it,” she says. “The stronger the craving’s going to become, then you’re going to be fixated on it.”
This runs counter to most diet culture advice, which preaches ironclad self-control.
But Kemps points to psychological evidence: delayed gratification often turns into obsession.
And obsession leads to bingeing.
Instead, the better approach?
Acknowledge the craving.
Decide consciously.
Eat the chocolate.
But do it without shame, and without the story that it means something profound about your physiology.
What This Means for You
So the next time you catch yourself longing for a double chocolate chip cookie—or a tuna sandwich with hot sauce and pickles—don’t fall for the old myth that your body is a finely tuned mineral detector.
Instead, consider what you’ve been feeling.
What have you been seeing?
Was there an Instagram reel of brownies?
A stressful meeting that drained your dopamine reserves?
Are you lonely, tired, anxious, nostalgic?
These aren’t deficiencies to be solved with supplements.
They’re emotions to be acknowledged.
And cravings?
They’re just the spark.
Whether you choose to indulge, distract, or override that urge, remember: your craving is a whisper from your brain, not a cry from your cells.
TL;DR?:
- Cravings are driven by psychology, not nutrient deficiencies.
- The visual sense plays a central role in how cravings develop.
- Simple visual tasks like playing Tetris or watching static can disrupt food fantasies.
- Giving in to cravings might actually be healthier than obsessively avoiding them.
- Understanding the emotional roots of your cravings gives you power over them.
