On the Coast – Families Issue 101 I August/September 2019 | Page 14

Lift your mood with
BY CLARE MARCANGELO
T
here is a lot of information about
food and nutrition on the internet.
A reader can find out about the
connection between food and general
health, chronic disease, living longer,
weight loss and many more. But the
connection between mood and food is a
relatively new science and really quite
fascinating.
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O N T H E C OA S T – FAM ILIES
It’s widely accepted that eating our
favourite foods, particularly things like
chocolate and sweet desserts make us
feel good. But the science behind this,
and food’s ability to influence feelings
goes far beyond taste.
Let’s take chocolate for an example, is
it a good mood food purely because it’s so
darn delicious?
Dark chocolate in particular contains
serotonin, and pre-cursers to serotonin,
sending out “feel good” signals. However,
the effect of consuming sweets on
serotonin levels tends to be short lived,
leaving us to crash down to reality. This
is also why relying on sugary foods to
enhance our mood can actually leave
us worse than when we started. Sugar