Question

Eating chocolate relieves stress

Comments

I think that moderate consumption of dark chocolate can indeed help relieve stress by boosting mood, lowering cortisol levels, and offering a comforting treat. However, it should be part of an overall healthy lifestyle, as overconsumption or reliance on chocolate for stress management can have the opposite effect.

Answer 1

Chocolate is a very enjoyable treat that everyone knows and loves. It also comes with some good health benefits. It has been proven to help reduce stress levels. First, the National Library of Medicine conducted a study and found that, “Consumption of 40 g of Dark and Milk chocolate daily during a period of 2 weeks appears to be an effective way to reduce perceived stress in females” (NIH). This shows that chocolate could be a good snack to help relieve some stress. Furthermore, From John Hopkins Medicine they stated that eating dark chocolate will help reduce levels of stress hormone cortisol. Which is beneficial because stress is a risk faster for cardiovascular disease. So dark chocolate consumption can help lower the risk of cardiovascular disease as well. To add on, The European Journal of Cardiovascular Medicine conducted a study, “Group I (no chocolate intake), LF nu significantly increased (p<0.001), HF nu decreased (p<0.001), and LF/HF ratio increased (p<0.05) post-task. In contrast, Group II (dark chocolate intake) showed no significant change in LF nu (p=0.77), HF nu (p=0.80), or LF/HF ratio (p=0.86), suggesting a buffering effect of dark chocolate on stress-induced autonomic imbalance as shown in Table 1” (European Journal of Cardiovascular Medicine). The study found dark chocolate may help reduce the body's stress response. The group that had the dark chocolate showed less stress related changes in heart-rate variability compared to the other group who did not eat chocolate. Moreover, an article titled Healthline conducted a study by having subjects consume chocolate that has 70% cacao and after only 30 minutes they had a massive increase in gamma frequencies in the major area of the brain which lasted for several hours. Gamma frequencies are good for our brains because they are associated with things like learning, memory, and processing information. Which is important because if you eat dark chocolate it can help increase your alertness and attention and can help you avoid becoming stressed. Not only that, a website titled Live Science conducted a study as well and, “...found that people who rated themselves highly stressed to begin with had lower levels of stress hormones after eating chocolate every day for two weeks” (Live Science). This also goes to prove that eating chocla†e can bring down one's stress levels. Overall, I believe that this is a very strong claim because there is plenty of evidence to back it up. 

Answer 2

My research supports the claim that eating chocolate can relieve stress, and especially dark chocolate. One study I looked at surveyed and studied 30 people each eating 40g of dark chocolate each day for two weeks. They found the stress level of the hormone cortisol was low as well as other stress hormones. The researchers said the “strong evidence” showed this amount of chocolate per day would relieve stress related metabolism. Another study involving 60 students saw stress levels drop significantly in the milk and dark chocolate groups saying 40g per day “appears to be an effective way  to reduce perceived stress in females.” A separate study  published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology tested dark chocolate and then having a student perform a stressful task. Dark chocolate reduces some of the body's responses to stress in a normally very stress causing environment. 

This research again had limitations. A somewhat old but relevant 2019 study of 26 adults found that high- polyphenol dark chocolate reduced cortisol but not much showing overall positive or negative mood changes. The researchers said this “was a small scale study” and described the findings to "warrant further investigation.” Another study involving 65 healthy men showed lowered responses to certain psychological stress compared to a placebo chocolate. These studies are all very controlled with certain types of dark chocolate. I would say this claim is true while remembering they took it consistently for a certain amount of time, and none of it was dramatic changes.

Journal of Proteome Research — Dark Chocolate and Stress-Related Metabolism

Controlled Clinical Study — Chocolate and Perceived Stress

Journal of the American College of Cardiology — Dark Chocolate and Stress Reactivity

2019 Study — Dark Chocolate, Cortisol and Mood

Randomized Controlled Trial — Dark Chocolate and Psychosocial Stress

Answer 3

So I looked into whether eating chocolate actually relieves stress, and turns out this one is mostly true, at least for dark chocolate. There's a bunch of real science behind it, not just people saying it because it feels true. One study I found, called "Dark Chocolate Intake Buffers Stress Reactivity in Humans," was published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. Basically, they found that when people ate dark chocolate with a lot of flavonoids in it (that's an antioxidant found in cocoa), their stress hormones didn't spike as much when something stressful happened. So it kind of acts like a cushion against stress.

Then there's an older one from 2009 in the Journal of Proteome Research, called "Metabolic Effects of Dark Chocolate Consumption on Energy, Gut Microbiota, and Stress-Related Metabolism in Free-Living Subjects." In this one, people ate dark chocolate every single day for two weeks, and it actually lowered their cortisol (that's the main stress hormone), especially for people who were more anxious to begin with. There's also a newer study from 2019 called "Effect of Polyphenol-Rich Dark Chocolate on Salivary Cortisol and Mood in Adults,".This one tested cortisol levels in people's spit after eating dark chocolate loaded with polyphenols, and it backs up what the older studies already found.

What I thought was actually the most useful one is a 2014 study called "Effects of chocolate intake on Perceived Stress; a Controlled Clinical Study," .This is the one that compared dark, milk, and white chocolate against each other in medical students, using an actual stress survey, so it's not just guessing which kind of chocolate matters. And then to see how this got reported to regular people, I checked out a Live Science article that like basically just explained the study in normal words, saying people who were already stressed out had lower stress hormones after eating chocolate daily for two weeks.

So overall, yeah, chocolate relieving stress is pretty legit, but only really for dark chocolate, and only shown so far in short two-week studies. Milk and white chocolate don't seem to do as much. Also, some of the "feeling less stressed" part could just be because eating something you like feels nice in the moment, not necessarily some special chemical thing happening in your brain. So I'd say the claim is mostly true, but it's not the full picture it works best with dark chocolate, and nobody's proven it fixes long-term stress.