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posted by martyb on Sunday July 02 2017, @01:51PM   Printer-friendly
from the chocolate++ dept.

A balanced diet is chocolate in both hands -- a phrase commonly used to justify ones chocolate snacking behavior. A phrase now shown to actually harbor some truth, as the cocoa bean is a rich source of flavanols: a class of natural compounds that has neuroprotective effects.

In their recent review published in Frontiers in Nutrition, Italian researchers examined the available literature for the effects of acute and chronic administration of cocoa flavanols on different cognitive domains. In other words: what happens to your brain up to a few hours after you eat cocoa flavanols, and what happens when you sustain such a cocoa flavanol enriched diet for a prolonged period of time?

Although randomized controlled trials investigating the acute effect of cocoa flavanols are sparse, most of them point towards a beneficial effect on cognitive performance. Participants showed, among others, enhancements in working memory performance and improved visual information processing after having had cocoa flavanols. And for women, eating cocoa after a night of total sleep deprivation actually counteracted the cognitive impairment (i.e. less accuracy in performing tasks) that such a night brings about. Promising results for people that suffer from chronic sleep deprivation or work shifts.

It has to be noted though, that the effects depended on the length and mental load of the used cognitive tests to measure the effect of acute cocoa consumption. In young and healthy adults, for example, a high demanding cognitive test was required to uncover the subtle immediate behavioral effects that cocoa flavanols have on this group.

Source: ScienceDaily

Journal Reference: Valentina Socci, Daniela Tempesta, Giovambattista Desideri, Luigi De Gennaro, Michele Ferrara. Enhancing Human Cognition with Cocoa Flavonoids. Frontiers in Nutrition, 2017; 4 DOI: 10.3389/fnut.2017.00019


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  • (Score: 3, Disagree) by Gaaark on Sunday July 02 2017, @08:20PM (1 child)

    by Gaaark (41) on Sunday July 02 2017, @08:20PM (#534230) Journal

    Nah, it's all that cancer causing diet pop they drink that kills the brain cells before they can get smarter.

    It's become known that acesulphame potassium causes cancer, so they start calling it by it's brand name, 'Aspartame'.

    Then, It's become known that 'Aspartame' causes cancer, so they revert back to calling it acesulphame potassium AND NO ONE NOTICES because all their brain cells are now cancer cells.

    Feel smarter?

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  • (Score: 2) by realDonaldTrump on Sunday July 02 2017, @09:25PM

    by realDonaldTrump (6614) on Sunday July 02 2017, @09:25PM (#534254) Homepage Journal

    Beautiful! I love the poorly educated!