The sensory engineering of UPFs also extends into the auditory domain.151 Increasingly, sound is used as part of the consumption experience and brand identity, which is a strategy known as sonic branding

The comparison is anchored in The Cigarette Century ,12 which provides a detailed historical account of how cigarettes were engineered for addictiveness. From this foundation, a framework of industrial strategies—such as dose manipulation, delivery speed, use of additives, and health washing—was developed as the basis for comparison with UPFs.

There is ongoing debate about whether UPFs should be considered addictive.9 Our analysis contributes to this debate by demonstrating how UPFs meet established addiction-science benchmarks, particularly when viewed through parallels with tobacco.

This engineered ease of consumption reduces oral and digestive effort and diminishes natural signals of fullness (i.e., vanishing caloric density), signaling to the brain that fewer calories are being consumed and encouraging greater intake