Thinking Nutrition

For the latest nutrition research and controversies

  • Home
  • About
  • Articles
    • Cancer
    • Diabetes
    • Gut Health
    • Mental Health
    • Women’s Health
    • Child Health
    • Heart Health
    • Eating Well
    • Managing Weight
    • Nutrition Supplements
    • Getting Active
    • Mythbusting
  • Podcast
  • In the Media
  • Services
  • Privacy
  • Contact
You are here: Home / Mental Health / Could your greengrocer hold the secret to happiness?

Could your greengrocer hold the secret to happiness?

November 8, 2016 by Tim Crowe 4 Comments

fruits vegetables happiness
Tangerine Family by Alex Janu. CC BY 2.0

Eating fruits and vegetables are good for your health in so many different ways. Now in the first major scientific study of its kind, eating more of these powerhouse foods has been linked to substantial increases in people’s happiness levels.

Fruits and vegetables have an abundance of health benefits. But it’s not from lack of scientific evidence for their benefit that explains why we don’t eat enough of these foods. In Australia, just 6 percent of people eat the recommended amount of vegetables each day. For fruit, only half eat the recommended number of serves.

In the search for perhaps a different angle to promote the health benefits of fruits and vegetables, researchers are  looking at their link with psychological health. Previous research has found some interesting associations with fruit and vegetable consumption and improved psychological health. But what is lacking is a large-scale study to really solidify this link.

Using a large sample of more than 12,000 randomly selected people in Australia, researchers were able to track their diet, health, happiness, life satisfactions and well-being from 2009 to 2013.

The key to happiness?

So what was the key finding? Happiness, life satisfaction and well-being all went up for each extra daily portion of fruits and vegetables eaten. And this was after making allowance for people’s changing incomes and personal circumstances. The happiness health links reached a peak at eight servings a day of fruits and vegetables. The improvements in mental health were seen within 24 months of increasing the amount of fruits and vegetables eaten.

The research team took it one step further and compared the mental health improvements to life changing situations. For someone going from eating no fruits and vegetables to eating eight portions a day, they could experience an increase in life satisfaction equivalent to moving from unemployment to employment.

Finally the researchers looked at the effect of a pro-active fruit and vegetable consumption campaign on dietary habits. Here they found a link between the intensity of the campaign, its outcomes in people eating more fruit and veg, and positive mental health benefits.

A challenge in getting a person to want to eat more healthy food is that health benefits may take decades to materialise. That green salad today may (or may not) mean a lower risk of cancer in 30 years. On that time-scale, the mental health benefits linked to eating more fruits and vegetables are closer to immediate. And improved mental health would help to reinforce the positive dietary change.

There are likely many reasons to explain a link between eating more fruits and vegetables and well-being. Higher levels of antioxidants is one possibility. Then there is the role of fibre in supporting a healthy population of gut bacteria. Gut fermentation products can act directly on the brain, potentially altering mood and behaviour.

What it all means

Diet and mental health is a rapidly growing research field. We can expect more research to come to light linking the benefits of plant-based foods with improved mental health. Rather than long-term, less immediate benefits, future health campaigns will have a new angle to focus on. Who doesn’t want to feel happier?

Share this:

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)

Filed Under: Mental Health Tagged With: fruits, happiness, mental health, vegetables

Comments

  1. Tim @ Pseudogynecomastia says

    November 25, 2016 at 3:46 pm

    Recent studies regarding the impact of the consumption of fruits and vegetables to mental health is rapidly growing and the results are all the same. It all improves the quality of our daily lives: from increase to happiness to body strengthening and I don’t believe newer studies will change it.

    Reply
  2. Kezia Kent says

    November 8, 2016 at 7:21 pm

    Thank you for this. Would it be possible to send through the whole article and not the abstract. Would love to read more about the study.

    My website in under construction at the moment.

    Reply
    • Tim Crowe says

      November 8, 2016 at 7:28 pm

      Hi Kezia. The article is hyperlinked in the blog post and full text access is available as part of the abstract.

      Reply
  3. Wafaa Beaini says

    November 8, 2016 at 7:10 pm

    Thank you very much for another fantastic post.

    Best regards,
    Wafaa

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Sign up for updates

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • RSS
  • Twitter

Recent Posts

  • How do the plant-based milks compare?
  • Magnesium: foods, functions and supplemental forms
  • Drink tea, stay healthy and carry on
  • Got iron? Foods, functions and insufficiencies
  • The science of soy: health, harms and hyperbole

Most Popular Posts

  • "Broccoli is bad for you, like, really toxic bad"
  • Steam, boil or fry? How cooking affects nutrient losses from foods
  • Eat vegetables to live longer
  • This is your brain on blueberries
  • 12 steps to writing a best-selling diet book
  • How using chopsticks can be good for your health

Get the Book

Understanding NutritionNow in its fourth edition, Understanding Nutrition is the leading text used in nutrition and dietetics courses in Australia and New Zealand. As one of the coauthors, I step you through core topics such as diet planning, macronutrients, vitamins and minerals and follow this with chapters on diet and health, sports nutrition, lifespan nutrition and food safety.

Work with me

If you have a project you would like to discuss be it website or newsletter content, blog or magazine articles, media copy or scientific writing (a career in medical research means I’m pretty handy in writing and reviewing papers and grants) then please get in touch with me.

Back to Top of Page ↑

Creative Commons Licence
Thinking Nutrition by Dr Tim Crowe is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

Copyright © 2021 · Magazine Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in