Chocolate Gives A Moment Of Pleasure For The Lonesome
For many people feeling depressed, a piece of chocolate offers them comfort and a moment of pleasure. Experts say this is due to the mood-enhancing ...
For many people feeling depressed, a piece of chocolate offers them comfort and a moment of pleasure. Experts say this is due to the mood-enhancing affects of chocolate. Not surprisingly, new studies indicate that depressed people eat more chocolate than those who aren’t depressed.
In a study done by several universities in California, 900 men and women were questioned about their chocolate consumption. None of the participants were on anti-depressants. The goal of the study was to find out how much chocolate the men and women ate on a regular basis and how often they ate the sugary treat.
A commonly accepted depression scale was used to gauge the mood of the participants. Scientists were able to detect a clear connection between the consumption of chocolate and feelings of depression among the participants.
The found on average, that the people who had depression ate about eight and a half servings of chocolate each month. By contrast, those who said they didn’t have depression ate only five and a half servings a month.
Those participants that were actually clinically depressed ate the most chocolate of all. They were found to consume an average of nearly 12 servings of chocolate monthly. Although, when asked, none of the participants felt that the chocolate positively affected their depression. For the study one serving of chocolate was one ounce or 28 grams.
The study conducted was not designed to determine why people eat more chocolate when they are depressed. Researchers deduced that depression may stimulate a craving for chocolate, making people consume chocolate to treat their condition.
Researchers have found that chocolate has mood-lifting benefits by the release of endorphins. Unfortunately, the process can have a cyclical effect – that by consuming a lot of chocolate, people may feel more depressed and want to eat more chocolate to feel better.
As much as researchers have learned from these studies, it’s clear that a lot more needs to be learned about the link between chocolate and depression.
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