Does Eating Fish, Meat, and Poultry Ruin Your Mood?

Posted on June 9, 2012 | 7 Comments

Cow’s in a good mood. What a great place to live!

Your mood might improve if you restrict meat, poultry, and fish, according to a pilot study in Nutrition Journal. I don’t have time to read it anytime soon. Why don’t you, and comment below?

My gut tells me these researchers are wrong.  At least for me.  To each his own.

-Steve

Reference: Beezhold, Bonnie and Johnston, Carol. Restriction of meat, fish, and poultry in omnivores improves mood: a pilot randomized controlled trial. Nutrition Journal 2012, 11:9 doi:10.1186/1475-2891-11-9. Published: 14 February 2012

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7 responses to “Does Eating Fish, Meat, and Poultry Ruin Your Mood?”

  1. Jim Jozwiak | June 9, 2012 at 10:08 am |

    I’m not paleo or diabetic and I haven’t read the study, but if I eat more protein than 0.82 times lean mass in pounds, my mood worsens and I get a lot of hangnails which go away quickly when I move the protein back down.

  2. stabbyr | June 9, 2012 at 4:17 pm |

    Emily Deans wrote about it http://evolutionarypsychiatry.blogspot.ca/2012/02/meatless-and-happy-in-short-term.html So a whole lot of anything to talk about, and only a few metrics like tension were statistically significant. They didn’t do a dietary analysis or anything. I suspect that they just improved dietary quality and offer some alternative explanations in the comments.

  3. stabbyr | June 9, 2012 at 4:20 pm |

    Oh you posted in it too! Well if you still haven’t read the study then I’ll just say that there isn’t much info. I think they are planning on doing a better quality trial soon. No guarantee that they’re not going to make sweeping changes and radically alter the vegetarian diet in the next one as those who study vegetarian diets often do.

  4. wildramp | June 11, 2012 at 10:43 am |

    Interesting. My dad had Parkinson’s disease and had to cut way back on proteins of all kinds…there is a neural component for sure and that may be some part of the mood issue.

    • Steve Parker, M.D. | June 13, 2012 at 5:08 am |

      Welcome, wild ramp..
      I see a Parkinsons patient in the hospital about once a month. None of them have mentioned protein restriction to me, nor is it a standard therapeutic approach. I’ll keep my eyes open for good data.

      -Steve