Today I took the youngest to a preschool friend's birthday party. It was at a gymnastics center, and even after an hour of bouncing and running around, the eager children began doing laps of the table after the happy birthday/cupcake portion of the celebration. Yet there is still a lack of appreciation of exactly how acutely diet can actively affect behavior. A recent, fascinatiing study (forwarded to me by Dallas Hartwig of Whole9Life) shows how dietary manipulation of tryptophan (and therefore central nervous system serotonin levels) can affect mutual trust when it comes to money (brand new article over at Psychology Today):
The Drink of Trust
I'd be interested to see the results of similar studies with intranasal oxytocin or orally administered Jack Daniels.
Other pertinent articles:
Sunlight, Sugar, and Serotonin
The Anger Drink
Dopamine Primer
Do Carbs Make You Crazy?
Do Carbs Keep You Sane?
In the mean time, eat whole foods and consider your behaviors with care :-)
Not sure this suggests anything about a whole foods diet. The tryptophan drink is the definition of processed.
ReplyDeleteThe point is that nutrients can have unexpected influence on behavior.
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