Correlation between depression and junk food found

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Skip this for better health!

Whenever you start looking for cause/effect relationships, you invariably run the risk of getting it wrong and possibly backwards. But in this study there is a pretty good case to be made for eliminating as much junk food from your diet as possible since the correlation is so strong. It is possible that depressed people just eat more junk food. But with what we know about how diet affects every area of our lives, it is very likely that whole, natural, healthy foods benefit our brain function. So with that in mind, check out this article over at MSNBC Health and pass it along to your friends and family who might be struggling with depression. My experience is that changing your diet and adding exercise to your daily regimen has a powerful effect on mood as well as physical well-being. For a good 6 meal per day diet, check out this page…

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British and French epidemiologists analyzed food and mood data from 3,486 men and women (average age 55) in the Whitehall II study on London-based office staff. Each participant answered a food frequency questionnaire in which they were asked how often they had eaten a designated portion size of a food during the previous year (set responses ranged from “never” to “six or more times per day”).

That data was then converted to a daily intake and two dietary patterns were identified: the “whole food pattern” (defined by a high daily intake of vegetables, fruits, and fish) and the “processed food pattern” (characterized by high consumption of sweetened desserts, chocolates, fried food, processed meat, pies, refined grains, high-fat dairy products, and condiments). Five years later, all the participants answered a short questionnaire designed to measure symptoms of depression in the general population.