My wife can swear that her mouth is on fire after eating certain foods, but when I try the same exact food I often barely detect the heat she’s talking about.
I wasn’t always like this, it was an acquired taste. Sweet chilli used to be hot to me, now I dabble with habanero, naga, etc so I know something has changed physiologically…what was it?
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Your nerves have literally been deadened.
No, that’s not a metaphor. That’s the literal definition of literally.
The primary, “This is hot!” molecule is capsaicin. Most mammals (including humans) have nerves that are sensitive to this chemical, and their reaction to capsaicin is what fuels the sensation of burning that spicy foods give. As you eat more and more spicy foods, those nerve receptors become deadened, the ends of them literally shriveling down. So it takes more and more capsaicin to get the same impact.
Your body doesn’t like pain (obviously). So if you are exposed to the same kind of pain over and over again, the body begins to adapt and close off pathways for the pain signal in that area to reach the brain. So regular exposure to spicy food can help stop it. There is a genetic component as well but your question seemed to me more about exposure rather than genetics.
Another example of your body adapting is people becoming accustomed to their environment. Like I live in the north east where it gets cold and snowy in the winter. I can go around in shorts and a t-shirt when it’s 40ish degrees out. Someone from Florida would think that’s insane. On the other hand if I was exposed to the Florida heat I’d be struggling while they’d be comfortable going about their business. Our brains are actively quieting uncomfortable sensations that we are exposed to regularly.
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i moved to germany from england and my spice tolerance is completely lost, even siracha is hot to me now.. I suffer when I go home and have a real curry but buy it hurts good.
Repeated consumption of spicy foods causes downregulation of the **TRPV1 receptor.** The TRPV1 receptor is the primary receptor that capsaicin binds to, whereby activation of said receptor, and subsequent firing of the neuron associated with it, causes the feeling of “spicy.”
It’s like drugs – if you consume drugs that act as agonists at dopamine receptors, those dopamine receptors will become downregulated (essentially, the total receptor density is reduced by comparison to pre-drugs) – and it then requires more of that drug to induce the same effect.
In the case with spicy foods, repeatedly triggering the TRPV1 receptor with capsaicin causes your body to reduce the total density of TRPV1 receptors, meaning it takes more and more spice to induce the same sensation – because you then have fewer receptors around to process the stimuli.
This was a bit of an oversimplification, but the easiest way to ELI5
There are a couple of things at play.
1) In your mouth (and other places on your body) you have pain receptors. These receptors are quite sensitive to capsaicin and when they come into contact with capsaicin, they signal sensations of heat and pain to your brain – your mouth is not actually burning, but your brain interprets those signals as burning. With repeated exposure to capsaicin, the receptors simply become desensitized, so over time, we perceive less pain and heat from the same level of spiciness / amount of capsaicin.
2) Endorphins (or the Happy Hormone for ELI5)!! When you eat spicy food, your body releases this hormone which is a natural painkiller and mood enhancer. The endorphins can create a feeling of “spicy high”. Overtime your body becomes more efficient at releasing these hormones when you eat spicy food, which contributes to the enjoyment and the experience of less pain.
3) Increased tolerance – Simply put, regular consumption of spicy food leads to increased tolerance for capsaicin. As you eat more hot foods and higher levels of heat/spiciness, your taste buds and sensory perception adjusts. – Similar effect when you go to a country/place with a very different climate than what you are used to. Over time your body adapts to the heat/humidity/cold/altitude etc.
Capsaicin has not been found to cause any long-term damage to your body. The changes that happen in your body is due to functional changes in the pain receptors rather than any structural damage.
Are you a big drinker? When I was drinking heavily I could eat the hottest food and be barely phased by it. 2 years sober now my tolerance for spicy food has dropped a lot! Someone told me it’s partly because booze slowly burns off your taste buds (no idea if there is any truth to that)
Spicy is not a taste, it’s a sensation. A pain sensation.
People who like spicy food are, in a sense, a bit masochists.
One thing I haven’t seen mentioned is that everyone has a different tolerance to capsaicin. Separate from pain tolerance, everyone reacts to capsaicin differently. So people that don’t feel the heat as much aren’t actually tougher necessarily, they could just have receptors that don’t react as strongly.
A lot of people like to act like they are tougher than others if they can eat spicier food, but it’s not necessarily a matter of toughness.
But maybe your wife is just a weakling that can’t handle pain and you’re a tough manly man with much higher pain tolerance.
So there are particular receptors that sense that hot food and give someone the sensation of heat. What happens is if you repeatedly eat hot food those receptors get down regulated. Basically there are fewer of them to sense chemical heat, and you feel less heat. If you keep eating increasingly hot spice foods this will continue to a point where something really “hot” to most people will be pretty tame to you. Your wife sounds like she is not eating these regularly which will mean this down regulation will not happen and will remain maximally sensitive to the heat. Anyway tolerance to spicy hot foods eaten regularly is caused by this process. If you wish to lose your tolerance to spicy hot foods, stop eating them for a bit, the receptors will be upregulated and you will become more sensitive to it again.
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