Don’t want to feel depressed and wish to have overall better mental well-being? You then might want to switch your fried snacks with healthy fruits and keep eating them more often.
Unsplash
This is according to a new study conducted by researchers from the College of Health and Life Sciences, Aston University. The study surveyed 428 adults from across the UK and looked at the relationship between their consumption of fruit, vegetables, sweet and savoury foods and their impact on mental health.
As per the survey, the more often people consumed fruits, the lower they scored for depression and higher scores for mental well-being, regardless of the overall quantity of the fruits they consumed.
On the other hand, those who consumed nutrient-poor foods — like fried food, crisps etc — were more likely to experience ‘everyday mental lapses’ as well as lower mental wellbeing. More number of lapses were linked with higher reported symptoms of depression, stress, and anxiety as well as lower mental wellbeing scores.
Surprisingly, there was no link between these everyday memory lapses and fruits/veggies intake or sweet snacks, which means there’s a strong link between nutrient-poor snacks and everyday lapse in mental health and psychological health.
Lead author, PhD student Nicola-Jayne Tuck said in a statement, It is possible that changing what we snack on could be a really simple and easy way to improve our mental wellbeing. Conversely, it is also possible that the forthcoming restriction of processed snack foods at checkouts, due to come in this October, could not only improve the country’s physical health but mental health too. Overall, it’s definitely worth trying to get into the habit of reaching for the fruit bowl.”