Does Diet Really Impact Mental Health?
Mental health is a complex field with medication and therapy making up a large component of the care and support. In the past decade there has been a rapid interest in the area of food and mood, particularly since gut health became a diet fashion trend. The truth is, nutrition appears to be impactful on our mental wellbeing.
Mental Health and Diet Research
Over the past five years, researchers from the Food and Mood Centre at Deakin University, have looked into themes of eating, assessing the impacts on people with severe depression. This robust study was ironically called the SMILES study, but it stands for ‘Supporting the Modifications of Lifestyle in Lowered Emotional States’. This study is one of the first of its kind in the world in terms of its study design that was randomised and controlled. In other words, this type of research is very reliable and minimally biased. For nutrition studies this is pretty rare so way to go Australia!
In a nutshell, the trial assessed people with depression who were actively treated with either therapy or medication. The participants received modified dietary counselling centred on the Australian and Greek Dietary Guidelines. After 12-weeks, researchers showed that the people who were provided nutrition counselling had significant improvements in their depression symptoms with roughly 33% meeting criteria for clinical remission of their depression. These improvements were also independent of any bodyweight changes and physical activity.
What Foods were Shown to be Best for Mental Health?
Notably, this style of eating was modelled off a Mediterranean dietary pattern which included a variety of good quality wholegrains, beans and legumes, fruits, vegetables, nuts, fish and seafood and of course extra virgin olive oil. While we know the nutrition space is flooded with misinformation, in terms of the research, this pattern of eating is considered the cream of the crop.
Whether it be the anti-inflammatory effects from this dietary pattern or the pre-biotic impacts it has on our gastrointestinal flora, what we do know is that this is a style of eating that includes a wide variety of nourishing foods.
The variety in locations within the Mediterranean, availability of food and cultural differences means that this style of eating isn’t exactly a diet, more a pattern rather than fixed rigid way to eat.
Food for Thought
I want to park the bus here and go back to my previous point about the Mediterranean diet. It’s not necessarily the best diet but it is the most researched. Many other regions of the world; namely Okinawa, Loma Linda and Nicoya also adopt healthful patterns of eating. I like to think of this as a pattern of eating and living which celebrates and enjoys food with others with the occasional mid-afternoon siesta. The trends from these patterns do remind us to celebrate a large variety of plant foods and slow down and rest.
