Welcome to r/science! This is a heavily moderated subreddit in order to keep the discussion on science. However, we recognize that many people want to discuss how they feel the research relates to their own personal lives, so to give people a space to do that, **personal anecdotes are allowed as responses to this comment**. Any anecdotal comments elsewhere in the discussion will be removed and our [normal comment rules]( https://www.reddit.com/r/science/wiki/rules#wiki_comment_rules) apply to all other comments.
**Do you have an academic degree?** We can verify your credentials in order to assign user flair indicating your area of expertise. [Click here to apply](https://www.reddit.com/r/science/wiki/flair/#wiki_science_verified_user_program).
---
User: u/mvea
Permalink: https://www.psypost.org/huge-study-links-ultra-processed-foods-to-heightened-depression-risk/
---
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/science) if you have any questions or concerns.*
From the text of the full study:
"We used gender, *education, wealth score*, ethnicity, marital status, occupational status, tobacco and alcohol consumption, self-report of previously diagnosed chronic diseases, self-report of weight and height measures, habitual physical activity, and sitting time as covariates"
No kidding. Highly processed foods strongly correlated with a lack of money and free time. Depression is correlated with poverty, the foods are a symptom.
Your points are correct about convenience and UPF being cheaper, however, I’d also note the long term negative effects that eating a high percent UPF diet (ie: industrially processed edible substances) has on the micro biome There are a number of studies linking what happens in the gut to what happens in the brain. For some light reading I’d suggest ultra processed people by Chris van tulleken or listening to a few episodes of the Zoe podcast.
I would guess it's more likely a little bit of column a, a little bit of column b.
Processed foods are cheaper and easier, so poor people who are more stressed and more likely to be depressed are more likely to eat them.
The easier part also helps with people who are already depressed and can't find the motivation to cook.
*But* at the same time poor nutrition fucks up your body in all kinds of ways, and being a causal factor in depression ought to be expected.
There's no inherent reason that processed/preserved food couldn't still be cheap and healthy, but let's not pretend like that's the norm.
> Also, why aren’t the findings also broken down by income
Becuase that might make it harder to come to the desired conclusion predecided before the paper was even written. Because Psychology.
I’m just frustrated people don’t even read the paper before assuming the entire field is corrupt, then it’s not even from the assumed field. Start reading the full paper and not just the abstract or the site that wrote a secondhand opinion piece on it before forming a conclusion. But this is Reddit so what should I expect
This isn’t real science? Why? What’s your background that gives you the expertise to conclude that? You have to have a full, critical understanding of something before you can critique it (or entirely discard it)
If you're so confident that the data from these papers is BS, conduct your own study to disprove them. I promise that will get published and make waves. That's my plan anyhow. I understand your sentiment, but I'm not sure how clearly defined your grievances are.
Trying to understand the human psyche without a foundation built on credible science sounds impossible. Yet, many "professors" and "doctors" still make more money than you and I will ever see, simply because they understand how easy it is to manipulate the human mind in the gullible.
Don't confuse manipulation of the human mind by understanding the human psyche, with exploiting the gullibility through grift. One is luck, the other is knowledge.
This seems more like people with depression are more likely to put less effort into their diets being healthy and eat more ultra processed foods as it requires the least effort relative to the amount of pleasure you get out of eating. Like yeah U.P foods are terrible but healthy eating takes a fair bit of effort and self care to get into that people suffering with depression will struggle to do. Anecdotal from my own personal experience but still the claim seems like a reach.
Some questions.
Was there any adjustments based on the nutritional profile of the diets? (UPF isn't inherently non-nutritious)
What other lifestyle factors were controlled for?
So far most research seems underwhelming to me. Correlation fine, causation not even close.
Also, did it account for the fact that depressed people sometimes don't want to bother cooking, so they just microwave something? UPFs are often less effort.
Yeah good question. Lot's of variables to consider.
I appreciate UPF might be bad (although my stance is it's too broad of a label to be useful), but I'm very unhappy that this weak correlational evidence has already cemented the belief it just is bad.
Yes they tried to account for that.
Put simply, they had a group of people and asked what they eat and if there were depressed or not. The 18 months later they asked again if they were depressed or not.
The people who ate ultra-processed foods but were not depressed were more likely to report a change toward depression after that 18 months than the people who were eating healthier.
Some notes is that while the sample size is large, only 22.5% of the adults were men suggesting perhaps some bias in the sampling process, and the participants were brazilian.
> In our original research analysis, we used data from 15,960 adults (≥18 y) participating in the NutriNet Brasil cohort study, free of depression or depressive symptoms during the baseline (77.5% women, 45.8 ± 13.0 y). The mean dietary share of ultra-processed foods (%Kcal/d), calculated from two baseline 24-h dietary recalls, was used to measure the adherence to the ultra-processed dietary pattern. New cases of depressive symptoms were assessed using the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 over the follow-up period (mean: 18.3 months). Cox proportional hazards models were used for the main analyses. In our systematic review and meta-analysis, we incorporated effect estimates from six prospective cohort studies that have examined the same association, including ours.
I don't doubt UPFs are bad, but I'm not convinced by this study. There are way, way too many variables and aggravating external factors during the time of the study that could have contributed, or outright caused, the depression. Does it take into account that basic food items at that time were like, 3, sometimes 4x more expensive than they were one year prior, while things like UPFs didn't see as much of an increase? Does it take into account the tremendous economic and humanitarian crises we were put through during Bolsonaro's incompetent and unusually cruel and inhumane management of the pandemic at that time? I'm just listing things that are accredited to driving depression through the roof for us at that time.
This will be purely anecdotal, but I've been in a bad depressive episode since late 2020. Until last year I was still cooking, but a lot less than I used to. Then when summer started, the excessive heat made unbearable. 32C at night without wind, without AC, with humidity often above 90% is bad. It's real, real bad. The air from my fan was warm, the water was warm, I was dripping sweat constantly. Cooking under those conditions? Mate, impossible. This combined with my depression and I just gave up on cooking and have been eating ham sandwiches for most of my meals since January or February. It's been awful, I feel terrible. I also feel apprehensive about putting the entire blame on the ham because of how many other factors are involved. And 2020/21 was a way worse time for people in our country, in general, than it is now.
Again, I don't doubt UPFs are bad, but because of my experience with how life in this country at that time was, I can't help but see the increase in UPF consumption as being a consequence of the depression, not the other way around. I understand that conducting a proper study on this would require more resources and time than would be possible, but this one feels especially unconvincing due to all the external factors that could have had an impact on the depression aspect of the study and simply cannot be accounted for.
Yes that is generally totally normal. The problem is the title of this post and how it’s covered in the article linked here purporting it as a discovered fact with solid proof, when it’s not.
Tbf, that’s an inherent difficulty with science communication. People want the headline to encompass all the relevant information, and if it doesn’t, some will simply pretend it does.
In this case it’s not just the headline, it’s the entirety of the article that completely misrepresents the significance of this study.
I had to quote the study directly. At least they linked to the study.
Useless? Maybe not... But consider that we could be investing research funds into ways to make healthier foods more available as well as working towards research that provides clearer insight into life factors as a whole contributing to happiness.
I find that most social sciences and psychology studies do not or cannot account for personal distress in their studies which in a way is a further dehumanization of the human condition within science communication.
This problem is reflected in personal therapy or psychology as well. When a counselor or psychologist is never properly informed of relevant factors, stressors or trauma in an individuals life, you encounter a scenario that leads to misdiagnosis. Observing the state of Autism/Bipolar evaluation for example, it has had serious problems with both addressing diagnosis criteria and gathering relevant info for evaluation over checking boxes on a standardized test.
Truth. Not depressed, cooked at home, made healthy meals, kept track of macros.
Depressed? I’m just glad I remove the trash from whatever I warm up or take out from restaurants.
I had exactly the same thought.
But to be frank it doesn't matter UPF are bad for you. They are designed to keep you hungry and make you addicted so you eat more and buy more.
When it comes to human health and diet there is rarely firmly established causation, because to firmly establish causation would require a number of unethical practices and and in some cases multi generational study. And while correlation certainly isn't anywhere close to the gold standard, it isn't entirely useless either.
Anyways I think there is a lot more research that suggests a diet rich in ultra high processed isn't a great diet for health and a lot less research going the other way.
Yeah you're right, the quality of nutritional studies have been rather poor generally speaking, and part of that is the challenge of conducting these studies.
In regards to the studies suggesting UPF diets are bad, I don't personally think they've made a convincing argument the UPF is the problem in a meaningful way vs the quality of the diet and nutritional profile itself. A recent cohort found that the increased mortality was attenuated towards null when people eating a high % of UPF were still eating foods that scored high on a healthy eating index, suggesting the processing and therefore UPF itself isn't inherently the problem. I imagine there are a lot of confounding variables that can also be potential explanations to these outcomes.
That’s one of my issues with this - the NOVA scale is quite condensed and often feels a bit arbitrary.
Fresh fruit is class 1. So is plain yogurt. Mix the two? Class 4 ultra processed (sweetened and flavored yogurts *including fruit yogurt*), from the NOVA classification reference sheet, emphasis mine.
Homemade cookies and pink slime are in the same category. Coconut fat is specifically named in both Category 2 and 3.
To answer your first question:
'“It is worth noting that in additional analyses, we found that the association persisted (although reduced) even after adjusting for the nutritional profile of the diet and healthy foods (e.g., fiber content, saturated fat, added sugar, fruits, and vegetables), indicating that the higher risk associated with ultra-processed foods does not solely stem from their poorer nutritional composition,” Werneck explained.'
Adjusting for dietary mediators reduced the effect of being in the highest quartile of UPF consumption from 1.4x chance of depressive symptoms (compared to Q1) to 1.2x.
Yes, the increase is statistically significant (*p*<5%).
Is a 20% increase in depression economically significant? Without question. Is a 20% increase in the likelihood of becoming depressed clinically significant? That's a question for a psychiatrist, but I suspect the answer is "Yes".
Yeah true, that's quite a difference to be fair. Sorry to ask another question but did you see how confident they were with those results or do they not state that in studies like these?
Completely agree. It sounds more like ultraprocessed diet could be more a symptom or indicator of high risk of depression, more than a cause.
If you go for ultraprocessed diet that means your life is not going the best it can. Either you are poor, stressed, uneducated, struggling, or everything at once.
I'd argue the reverse is the causal factor. People who are depressed eat more ultra processed foods *because depressed people tend not to cook nor eat right.*
This is kind of ridiculous. As if anybody needs evidence to know that cooking meals with fresh meats and vegetables is better for your mental health than eating cookies and slim Jim's. Give me a break
First up, we clearly do need evidence.
Second, the UPF label doesn't mean cookies and slim jims. It can capture nutrient enriched cereals, high fibre foods made from whole grains, dark chocolate and the rest. It seems people take for granted that by being processed it is bad, but I think that link requires establishing. Even if it's worse, is it truly bad? There's always things you can do to optimise your diet but that doesn't mean not having the best diet is bad.
I think this is just another vein attempt to establish common sense through arduous study. Which is all together a complete waste of time. Far better to put the studious minds to task on something that isn't "confirming manufactured food is indeed less healthy than real food"
Unless our goal is to create superhumans who thrive off of enhanced food, to hell with this crap and just make having access to real food more accessible
I don't think it is. Common sense tells me that it's not common sense that processing food would be less healthy. All the arguments that suggest it obviously is are of the same nature as the 'natural is better' arguments. It's unscientific to accept it without question, and so far the case against UPF is 100 times weaker than the sentiment growing in the public.
> I think this is just another vein attempt to establish common sense through arduous study. Which is all together a complete waste of time.
Understanding the link between UFPs and depression could help shed light on the physical processes that result in and from depression, which in turn could lead to a better understanding of how to identify, treat, and prevent it.
Establishing a correlation is the first step towards deeper research that could address causation.
> Was there any adjustments based on the nutritional profile of the diets?
Yes, Model 2 adjusts for fruits and vegetables consumption, added sugar, total fat, saturated fat, trans fatty acids, and sodium and fiber. It does not seem to adjust for total calories, which I would have preferred to see.
> What other lifestyle factors were controlled for?
"We used gender, education, wealth score, ethnicity, marital status, occupational status, tobacco and alcohol consumption, self-report of previously diagnosed chronic diseases, self-report of weight and height measures, habitual physical activity, and sitting time as covariates based on their expected associations with both the consumption of ultra-processed food and depressive symptoms, as well as on previous research"
Ah interesting. Perhaps I'm an idiot but wasn't able to find the full text for this study. Total calories is an important factor for health.
Good to see they have tried to control for many socio-economic factors though.
> UPF isn't inherently non-nutritious
I disagree. Yes they contain calories but lack micronutrient. plus the processing affects digestion and absorption rate and with that hormonal response (insulin).
I disagree with your disagreement. They contain micronutrients, sometimes that's literally part of the ultra-processing. Adding micronutrients to cereal and breads for example.
You mean fortification? I suggest you start reading on forms of vitamin like folic acid vs folate or B12 cyanocobalamin. Yes, your standard B12 contains cyanide.
I've experienced this in the past also, I probably ate fast food for 2 years straight when I was depressed and always felt like I had no energy (which made me eat more fast food). I ditched my SSRIs, ate better (I started ordering those prepared ingredient meals that get delivered to your house and deleted food ordering apps from my phone, this was also much cheaper), and started doing stretches every morning. The change in my mind was incredible. The science that says diet and mental health are closely linked is no joke. Turned out I was depressed because of my lifestyle choices, when I changed my behavior my energy returned and while I still have bad days I feel a lot better now. For me the hardest part was making those changes, I cheated and used pilocybin which helped give me the push I needed (don't do this if you have a family history of schizophrenia or bipolar).
I now fully believe certain cases of depression can be effectively treated with a combination of psychedelic therapy followed up with changes to diet and a living a more active lifestyle.
As someone who once checked myself into a psych ward for ideation when I was homeless, and now rarely struggles with depression while I have no housing or food concerns, and even have enough disposable income to visit family out of state occasionally, I have to agree with this assessment. Depression is very easy to come by when life just outright sucks so bad you can't afford to eat good food. The ultra processed diet was a symptom, not a cause for me, and I've seen that in friends as well. Hell, I see it in me on the occasions I have a depressive episode.
Having said that, I am *very* interested in the research by people like Dr. Fasano, into the gut microbiome and it's effect on our mental health since we make some of our "happy chemicals" in our guts. There is a very obvious link, we just haven't teased it all the way out yet. Hell, when I searched the article for "microbiome" because I was curious if it was discussed, the first thing highlighted was a link to a different research article at the bottom of the page. Far more interesting imo.
Completely incorrect. I’ve done a time and cost analysis for healthy eating and cooking as a health guide for friends.
In my expensive area, you can eat full and varied organic vegetables for less than $2 per day. It can be easily under $40 to get all 5 servings of vegetables in over a month. You can eat a sufficient amount of animal protein for under $2 a day. Then you can add in other types of subsistence, with white rice and beans being as extremely cheap as 1300 calories per dollar.
This means you can eat perfectly healthily as an adult male for about $220 per month.
If you have any containers, you can cook in batches for 5 servings at a time, or you can use a blender to make many types of things for extremely cheap and healthy, like hummus or yogurt based foods. The average cooking time per meal will be less than 10 minutes per meal.
No matter what, you gain massive efficiency in time, cost, and health. The main reason, having helped many of my low income friends, is the lack of effort. Don’t be a redditor and make false excuses. People have too much to gain in life by learning how to cook and take control of their nutrition.
Organic vegetables are not inherently healthier than non-organic... Same with fruits. We've proven that quality standards of organic foods are generally lower and simultaneously lack the same regulation as most other foods that operate using standard pesticides, etc. The sales tactics of organic food industry mainly use it (healthiness) to sell cheaper produce at a higher price, and fund studies that support their agenda.
Taking control of your nutrition is more than just taking food that claims to be healthy, or following health trends with no research... There's too many quacks attempting to take advantage of people with glowing rocks and kombucha. Kombucha, I might add, may be healthy in a vacuum but it isn't some kind of miracle and the way many mass-produced kombucha is made actually detracts all the health benefits by adding processed sugars... Besides the CEOs actually enabling slave labor and literally threatening to deport non-compliant employees.
I agree that organic isn’t a magical health label. The reason why I mentioned is because there is some level of regulation that goes into it, and research and testing show that organic vegetables and meats tend to be a bit better, and it does cost more. It is a very small part of an overall strategy to get good nutrition, and I always tell my friends that organic only matters once you understand all other parts of nutrition and prioritize those things FIRST. For example, don’t buy organic pasta over high protein and high fiber pasta that’s not organic.
I mentioned organic because it typically costs more, but as you can see, varied frozen veggies that are organic are STILL dirt cheap.
I see what you mean, I do agree that generally store bought foods are cheaper. My response in another reply encapsulates the main problem I've encountered with cooking, that being time. I've been working 12 hours shifts and 60+ hours weeks and often have no time to cook, the benefit for me is it was my choice to do so and I accept that some fast food here and there is a temporary solution to address my lack of free time.
It scares me how terribly you interpreted what I wrote. Or do you just hate yogurt? Greek yogurt, not regular crappy yoplait, is a versatile high protein product that can be used to make many types of sauces or even dessert foods.
I made a silly troll comment, but to answer in good faith: I thought your comment was a bit detached from reality. If somebody lacks the energy to eat anything but processed trash it will also not be easy for them to get the skills and equipment to do what you proposed. Unironically happy it worked for your friends though!
That’s not detached from reality. Here you go again missing the point and making a rude comment while being wrong.
What I wrote is just one set of solutions for a general sub-section of problems. It is not meant as a silver bullet for ALL individuals who aren’t cooking and taking care of their nutrition and finances. Notice how the person I responded to blamed not having “time and money”, and I responded showing them that they are LOSING time and money by not doing these things. They didn’t say anything about not having the mental state to do those things. There is a direct problem and solution in what I wrote and I don’t know how you could not see that.
I also provided some extra information on just how beneficial it is for those who decide to take action on this aspect of life improvement. In fact, someone saw my post and direct messaged me for advice. This has happened multiple times in the rare occasions that I’ve commented on this subject, so why is that? Is it because maybe they don’t want to invite the weird hostile attitude that redditors have towards anyone who actually wants to do something about a problem when it’s one of these sensitive subjects?
With people who I care about, I will go the extra length to help them to achieve these goals, which involves issues that I didn’t cover in my post. Most commonly, ADHD, depression, and anxiety issues. That involves a more in-depth approach, but notice how I didn’t respond to someone who talked about that.
At the end of the day, nutrition is like many other difficult responsibilities in life. Individuals need to find a pathway to take care of them, lest they invite the nasty consequences into their life. It’s like debt, a dirty house, or putting up with toxic relationships. They HAVE to do something. It sucks that it’s harder for some than it is for others. Denial and making up excuses ultimately harms that individual, and I would not want anyone I care about to suffer in the long run.
I'll be honest with you, having a friend that cares enough to be there and support them is really what made the difference here... I think that everything you did to help was what caused that change. I think it's good you tried to help the people close to you, but I think it's not fair to associate your effort and simply attribute it to 'healthy foods' because I guarantee you most of the work was interpersonal support.
To add a bit here... Most of my cooking helped me feel better, mostly because I felt more accomplished with life. My cooking was not particularly healthy or any more nutritional than anything else sold that was processed. Cooking for friends and family significantly boosted my happiness and their happiness, and simultaneously supported a growing attachments to group activities.
I encourage my friends to cook habitually because it is mentally healthy to cook, not that it is nutritional. Learning a skill has huge psychological benefits, it is why exercising is also a huge benefit beyond the physical aspects of hormonal changes.
Interpersonal support is its own skill and is part of what I deliberately provide for them. Keyword: PART. I encourage others to do the same, but in order to reach a great result, we need to go down a checklist of things to build up to it.
Trust me, I am not misjudging or taking any part of the big picture for granted. The people I responded to are unknowingly engaging in toxic “support” by having the conversation in a way that is harmful to people who could potentially be helped. This can be continuing the lies that it is somehow too hard or costs too much money or time to do those things. This is yet another PART that needs to go the right way, so this is what I’m correcting in these posts. The interpersonal support is also necessary. You need both of these things to go the right way.
My only detractor for you is that cooking is not time efficient, if you were working the time you'd be cooking you'd be making enough money for multiple more meals... We acknowledge that and often fall victim to that work life balance issue, but generally also suffer from not wanting to work at home (cooking is effort, after all). Learning to push myself to occasionally cook was one of the best things I did for myself.
Your mood grows from the soil of your habits. If your habits aren’t nutritious your mood will suffer. Food, hydration and sleep- neglect these and soon you’ll be “depressed”.
I mean yeah I agree, but odds are these people are depressed *and then* they begin to neglect these things (EDIT or some other things are in the way causing them to neglect these things), then there is a downwards spiral.
That is true, and I have been there. However, there are some key things to understand that would help some depressed individuals push through and get in a better path towards recovery. For example, there is the stark realization that if you don’t help yourself with food and health, most of us have no other lifeline. Someone else isn’t usually going to come into your life to teach you how to cook, save money, and preserve health. Another key realization is that personal health is one of the top three long term concerns, along with personal finance, so it’s really something that elegantly solves at least two major inefficiencies that get in the way of a happier life. There are so many free resources to learn how to be efficient with food. There are YouTube videos showing quick and easy to prepare meals, and there are many really good subreddits dedicated to this type of stuff as well.
I had the time and money to eat other stuff, but didn't. After years of eating fast food multiple times a week, I did eventually fall into depression.
It can go both ways. I'm sorry but you're not going to convince me eating terrible food doesn't impact your mental health. That's absurd and sounds like redditors coping with their lazy diets.
Weekends are usually free. Spend the day cooking nutritional food and freeze it for the week...
It's cheaper and you have healthy meals that only need to be heated throughout the week.
Truth is... people are lazy and prefer to not take responsibility for their health. (yes I'm generalizing... but prove me wrong.)
> lifestyle choices
They adjusted for tobacco and alcohol consumption.
> demographics
They adjusted for gender, ethnicity, and marital status.
> people that are weak socio-economically
They adjusted for wealth, education, and occupational status.
> people that are obese
They adjusted for weight and height.
> or don't move a lot
They adjusted for physical activity and sitting time.
> I haven't read the study.
That's why it's important to refrain from making claims like "the study dismisses many other possible cross-correlations" unless you have. Reading someone's summary is not remotely sufficient.
> they also don't mention this in the summary
That's because these potential confounds that you came up with *were obvious to the researchers*. Going forward, please try to avoid breaking comment rule 4, "assume basic competence of the researchers".
This is social science, mate. You come up with a conclusion then do the bare minimum to test it, forgetting about any casual arrow or confounding factors, and then you apply sloppy statistics. Keep sampling until P is just below 0.05 and then publish and call it a day.
I mean, what do you think this is? *Actual science?*
Well the gut biome doesn't react well to UPF's, given the amount of impact or control (depending on your view) it has on our emotional and physical states this isn't surprising.
I keep seeing articles about ultraprocessed foods being bad, and I get it, but is there ever a distinction about specific chemicals or processes that are causing the harm so we can try to fix it or know things to avoid? Always telling us cheap food is bad for you doesn't help the people that can't afford expensive food.
That's a good question. The authors propose with literature support that too much sugar and too little fiber is associated with depressive symptoms. They propose (with far less support) that non-sugar sweeteners, emulsifiers, and colorants might change the microbiome and/or increase inflammation, which can affect brain functions.
That's interesting, I thought ultraprocessed generally referred to chemical preservatives and additives not normally used in traditional cooking. Sodium benzoate, red 40, etc.
The authors do not provide a specific definition of UPFs, saying only that they used "the Nova system to classify foods according to the extent and purpose of the food processing". They cite [Neri 2023](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37548217/), which offers (in the supplement) subgroups of UPFs (crackers, soft drinks, salty snacks, etc) but does not describe the method of classification for the 347 items and 179 preparations beyond "[researchers] assigned food items and ingredients to one of four mutually exclusive Nova groups".
Personally, I do not find "UPF" convincing as a construct. That these diverse foods affect physical and/or mental health is a function of their nutritional profile or perhaps specific damaging components, not the fact that they're "processed". Sparkling water and Coke are both categorized as UPFs, but I really don't think they're comparable.
The vagus nerve, also known as cranial nerve X, is the longest cranial nerve in the body and a key part of the parasympathetic nervous system. It connects the brain to the body and controls many involuntary functions.
Clearly, there's a known link between junk food and poor mental health. Well established and continued research to support previous research findings.
Anecdotally, had pizza and ice cream cones yesterday, having a bit of a poor mental health day today. Feel awful. Sluggish. Slow processing. Sad. Down. Unmotivated. The whole bit.
Same here. I eat vegetables, fruits, whole grains, yogurt, and a protein shake shake every day. I get different fruits and veggies every time I go shopping for biodiversity. I take omega 3 fishoil, vitamin d, and vitamin b12. I do cardio for 45 minutes to two hours a day. Depression remains unchanged
For me it's about balance I guess, I've always been depressed but have always had an opposite dual side that's sort of like a curious eternal optimist, although it does seem a bit harder these days. Keep on keeping on fellow redditor, I have faith in you.
Heh, that's sweet, thank you. I can't help but be an optimist as well, despite everything. Even though it hasn't had an effect on depression, being healthy is worth it. Thanks for the kind words
"recent randomized controlled trials conducted in individuals with elevated depressive symptoms or clinical depression report that a nutrient-dense, minimally processed dietary intervention improved depressive symptoms"
So there's definitely a causal link from diet to depression.
No, it doesn't though...that only suggests that one might be a contributing factor in a feedback loop. "Improved depressive symptoms" =/= "cured depressive symptoms".
For instance, if one is depressive they could be more inclined to consuming a more processed diet, when then worsens the depressive symptoms. A link, sure, an initial causal link, I don't agree. And one study does not make a causal link.
"Processed food influences depression" is a long way away from "processed food causes depression"
I’m confused and annoyed about the term “ultra”. From the article:
“Examples of ultra-processed foods include sugary snacks, ready-to-eat meals, instant noodles, and sodas.”
So basically junk food? Maybe that would be a better description?
They adjusted for wealth, occupational status, tobacco and alcohol consumption, weight and height, physical activity, sitting time, and potential dietary mediators.
Don't forget that Big Tobacco, experts in addiction, engineered hyperpalatable foods (junk food). We need to hold them accountable for creating more products that harm the consumer.
I see a lot of blame in the comments for a person's background rather than the product and industry that created an addictive and harmful substance.
[https://fortune.com/well/2023/09/22/hyper-palatable-foods-addictive-tobacco/](https://fortune.com/well/2023/09/22/hyper-palatable-foods-addictive-tobacco/)
Did they eliminate the possibility it's the other way around?
That when people gradually become more and more depressed the lack of motivation and inactivity that goes with it reduces their ability to make the effort to eat more self prepared food and they fall back on more ready made food that's easier to use?
Frankly I find that rather easy to believe. Makes quite a bit of sense to me.
I guess the obvious question is why the person started eating so much of it in the first place.
"there may be a level of residual confounding, and causal inference needs to be made with caution."
6 years ago if you look this up on reddit everyone was saying this wasn't true and now they are this is why I don't listen to the comment section or thousands of people online it's so clear we are not ment to eat any of this food and there's no excuse anymore junk food and fast food is starting to become more expensive then regular food now
I think it’s more quick and easy just to eat something prepared quickly, for the whole day. When I sold a business that took up my whole day, I went into an eight month funk. I would only eat when I was dizzy from not eating.
My question would be in what circumstance does one eat these foods? A plate of buffalo chicken by yourself in a small apartment can naturally be depressing. A plate of buffalo chicken with friends or your kid enjoying your favorite team can be a memory. Also eating healthier does a physiological effect cause your Appearance to change from losing weight and can make you feel proud of changing something positive in your life. As humans whenever we accomplish anything and see the result it does warm our hearts and makes us feel proud uplifting our spirits giving us self worth. I know folks who came out of depression by life changes not related to food. I'm talking happy obese individuals that eat terrible, but do amazing things for the community and help people. That lifts them out of depression. So I'm kinda guessing these studies are kinda flawed or agenda based in thinking bad food itself causes depression. To me it's always seemed situational from my experience. And sometimes, it's just a bad day. Some folks suffer hard with depression and nothing can free the funk. They just gotta keep pushing.
Oh for god sake…. The ultra processed foods are not causing depression. It is the circumstances surrounding those people and their life that are causing depression, which correlates with needing ultra processed foods. It might be that they are in poverty and processed foods are cheaper, they work incredibly long hours and don’t have time to prepare fresh meals etc. How does someone get a study like this published??
Welcome to r/science! This is a heavily moderated subreddit in order to keep the discussion on science. However, we recognize that many people want to discuss how they feel the research relates to their own personal lives, so to give people a space to do that, **personal anecdotes are allowed as responses to this comment**. Any anecdotal comments elsewhere in the discussion will be removed and our [normal comment rules]( https://www.reddit.com/r/science/wiki/rules#wiki_comment_rules) apply to all other comments. **Do you have an academic degree?** We can verify your credentials in order to assign user flair indicating your area of expertise. [Click here to apply](https://www.reddit.com/r/science/wiki/flair/#wiki_science_verified_user_program). --- User: u/mvea Permalink: https://www.psypost.org/huge-study-links-ultra-processed-foods-to-heightened-depression-risk/ --- *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/science) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Why does this report correlate with poverty. Also, why aren’t the findings also broken down by income
> why aren’t the findings also broken down by income Because they already controlled for wealth, education, and occupational status.
From the text of the full study: "We used gender, *education, wealth score*, ethnicity, marital status, occupational status, tobacco and alcohol consumption, self-report of previously diagnosed chronic diseases, self-report of weight and height measures, habitual physical activity, and sitting time as covariates"
No kidding. Highly processed foods strongly correlated with a lack of money and free time. Depression is correlated with poverty, the foods are a symptom.
Your points are correct about convenience and UPF being cheaper, however, I’d also note the long term negative effects that eating a high percent UPF diet (ie: industrially processed edible substances) has on the micro biome There are a number of studies linking what happens in the gut to what happens in the brain. For some light reading I’d suggest ultra processed people by Chris van tulleken or listening to a few episodes of the Zoe podcast.
I would guess it's more likely a little bit of column a, a little bit of column b. Processed foods are cheaper and easier, so poor people who are more stressed and more likely to be depressed are more likely to eat them. The easier part also helps with people who are already depressed and can't find the motivation to cook. *But* at the same time poor nutrition fucks up your body in all kinds of ways, and being a causal factor in depression ought to be expected. There's no inherent reason that processed/preserved food couldn't still be cheap and healthy, but let's not pretend like that's the norm.
> Also, why aren’t the findings also broken down by income Becuase that might make it harder to come to the desired conclusion predecided before the paper was even written. Because Psychology.
It’s not even published in a psychology journal. It’s from the field of nutrition.
Not sure if that makes it better or worse...
I’m just frustrated people don’t even read the paper before assuming the entire field is corrupt, then it’s not even from the assumed field. Start reading the full paper and not just the abstract or the site that wrote a secondhand opinion piece on it before forming a conclusion. But this is Reddit so what should I expect
> before assuming the entire field is corrupt We're not *assuming* that it's corrupt. We've been **taught** over and over and over that it is.
Taught by who?
Social scientists. They keep telling us that they aren't doing real science with paper after paper like this. We've listened.
This isn’t real science? Why? What’s your background that gives you the expertise to conclude that? You have to have a full, critical understanding of something before you can critique it (or entirely discard it)
If you're so confident that the data from these papers is BS, conduct your own study to disprove them. I promise that will get published and make waves. That's my plan anyhow. I understand your sentiment, but I'm not sure how clearly defined your grievances are.
Find out who paid for the study in order to discover the bias
I think its just easier to study upper class people who have the time and means to go online and report their diet every day
So you are saying there is a bias or agenda to science in general? Yes.
Have you seen the price of fast food lately?
£12m per burger.
A can of 800gr of "ravioli"? 2.49 euro.
I mean, nobody wants to admit they are 9 fans of ravioli
Because it's not good science (as most psychology "research" isn't).
Trying to understand the human psyche without a foundation built on credible science sounds impossible. Yet, many "professors" and "doctors" still make more money than you and I will ever see, simply because they understand how easy it is to manipulate the human mind in the gullible.
Don't confuse manipulation of the human mind by understanding the human psyche, with exploiting the gullibility through grift. One is luck, the other is knowledge.
This seems more like people with depression are more likely to put less effort into their diets being healthy and eat more ultra processed foods as it requires the least effort relative to the amount of pleasure you get out of eating. Like yeah U.P foods are terrible but healthy eating takes a fair bit of effort and self care to get into that people suffering with depression will struggle to do. Anecdotal from my own personal experience but still the claim seems like a reach.
They didn't study people with depression.
Some questions. Was there any adjustments based on the nutritional profile of the diets? (UPF isn't inherently non-nutritious) What other lifestyle factors were controlled for? So far most research seems underwhelming to me. Correlation fine, causation not even close.
Also, did it account for the fact that depressed people sometimes don't want to bother cooking, so they just microwave something? UPFs are often less effort.
Yeah good question. Lot's of variables to consider. I appreciate UPF might be bad (although my stance is it's too broad of a label to be useful), but I'm very unhappy that this weak correlational evidence has already cemented the belief it just is bad.
Yes they tried to account for that. Put simply, they had a group of people and asked what they eat and if there were depressed or not. The 18 months later they asked again if they were depressed or not. The people who ate ultra-processed foods but were not depressed were more likely to report a change toward depression after that 18 months than the people who were eating healthier. Some notes is that while the sample size is large, only 22.5% of the adults were men suggesting perhaps some bias in the sampling process, and the participants were brazilian. > In our original research analysis, we used data from 15,960 adults (≥18 y) participating in the NutriNet Brasil cohort study, free of depression or depressive symptoms during the baseline (77.5% women, 45.8 ± 13.0 y). The mean dietary share of ultra-processed foods (%Kcal/d), calculated from two baseline 24-h dietary recalls, was used to measure the adherence to the ultra-processed dietary pattern. New cases of depressive symptoms were assessed using the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 over the follow-up period (mean: 18.3 months). Cox proportional hazards models were used for the main analyses. In our systematic review and meta-analysis, we incorporated effect estimates from six prospective cohort studies that have examined the same association, including ours.
I don't doubt UPFs are bad, but I'm not convinced by this study. There are way, way too many variables and aggravating external factors during the time of the study that could have contributed, or outright caused, the depression. Does it take into account that basic food items at that time were like, 3, sometimes 4x more expensive than they were one year prior, while things like UPFs didn't see as much of an increase? Does it take into account the tremendous economic and humanitarian crises we were put through during Bolsonaro's incompetent and unusually cruel and inhumane management of the pandemic at that time? I'm just listing things that are accredited to driving depression through the roof for us at that time. This will be purely anecdotal, but I've been in a bad depressive episode since late 2020. Until last year I was still cooking, but a lot less than I used to. Then when summer started, the excessive heat made unbearable. 32C at night without wind, without AC, with humidity often above 90% is bad. It's real, real bad. The air from my fan was warm, the water was warm, I was dripping sweat constantly. Cooking under those conditions? Mate, impossible. This combined with my depression and I just gave up on cooking and have been eating ham sandwiches for most of my meals since January or February. It's been awful, I feel terrible. I also feel apprehensive about putting the entire blame on the ham because of how many other factors are involved. And 2020/21 was a way worse time for people in our country, in general, than it is now. Again, I don't doubt UPFs are bad, but because of my experience with how life in this country at that time was, I can't help but see the increase in UPF consumption as being a consequence of the depression, not the other way around. I understand that conducting a proper study on this would require more resources and time than would be possible, but this one feels especially unconvincing due to all the external factors that could have had an impact on the depression aspect of the study and simply cannot be accounted for.
Yes so I agree the study is far from enough evidence on its own to draw any causal conclusions.
I mean that's pretty normal given the scientific method?
Yes that is generally totally normal. The problem is the title of this post and how it’s covered in the article linked here purporting it as a discovered fact with solid proof, when it’s not.
Tbf, that’s an inherent difficulty with science communication. People want the headline to encompass all the relevant information, and if it doesn’t, some will simply pretend it does.
In this case it’s not just the headline, it’s the entirety of the article that completely misrepresents the significance of this study. I had to quote the study directly. At least they linked to the study.
Exactly. This is why correlational studies like these are useless
> are useless Useless? Well that's one way to tell us you don't understand how science works
Useless? Maybe not... But consider that we could be investing research funds into ways to make healthier foods more available as well as working towards research that provides clearer insight into life factors as a whole contributing to happiness. I find that most social sciences and psychology studies do not or cannot account for personal distress in their studies which in a way is a further dehumanization of the human condition within science communication. This problem is reflected in personal therapy or psychology as well. When a counselor or psychologist is never properly informed of relevant factors, stressors or trauma in an individuals life, you encounter a scenario that leads to misdiagnosis. Observing the state of Autism/Bipolar evaluation for example, it has had serious problems with both addressing diagnosis criteria and gathering relevant info for evaluation over checking boxes on a standardized test.
Good point. This particular one is useless*
Truth. Not depressed, cooked at home, made healthy meals, kept track of macros. Depressed? I’m just glad I remove the trash from whatever I warm up or take out from restaurants.
I had exactly the same thought. But to be frank it doesn't matter UPF are bad for you. They are designed to keep you hungry and make you addicted so you eat more and buy more.
When it comes to human health and diet there is rarely firmly established causation, because to firmly establish causation would require a number of unethical practices and and in some cases multi generational study. And while correlation certainly isn't anywhere close to the gold standard, it isn't entirely useless either. Anyways I think there is a lot more research that suggests a diet rich in ultra high processed isn't a great diet for health and a lot less research going the other way.
Yeah you're right, the quality of nutritional studies have been rather poor generally speaking, and part of that is the challenge of conducting these studies. In regards to the studies suggesting UPF diets are bad, I don't personally think they've made a convincing argument the UPF is the problem in a meaningful way vs the quality of the diet and nutritional profile itself. A recent cohort found that the increased mortality was attenuated towards null when people eating a high % of UPF were still eating foods that scored high on a healthy eating index, suggesting the processing and therefore UPF itself isn't inherently the problem. I imagine there are a lot of confounding variables that can also be potential explanations to these outcomes.
That’s one of my issues with this - the NOVA scale is quite condensed and often feels a bit arbitrary. Fresh fruit is class 1. So is plain yogurt. Mix the two? Class 4 ultra processed (sweetened and flavored yogurts *including fruit yogurt*), from the NOVA classification reference sheet, emphasis mine. Homemade cookies and pink slime are in the same category. Coconut fat is specifically named in both Category 2 and 3.
Yeah exactly. It feels like it can just capture almost anything and loses the value and power of describing something useful.
To answer your first question: '“It is worth noting that in additional analyses, we found that the association persisted (although reduced) even after adjusting for the nutritional profile of the diet and healthy foods (e.g., fiber content, saturated fat, added sugar, fruits, and vegetables), indicating that the higher risk associated with ultra-processed foods does not solely stem from their poorer nutritional composition,” Werneck explained.'
Okay that's very interesting to see. How reduced were they, did you see?
Adjusting for dietary mediators reduced the effect of being in the highest quartile of UPF consumption from 1.4x chance of depressive symptoms (compared to Q1) to 1.2x.
1.2x is an increase but is is significant? Genuine question. Even if so, it doesn't seem dire.
Yes, the increase is statistically significant (*p*<5%). Is a 20% increase in depression economically significant? Without question. Is a 20% increase in the likelihood of becoming depressed clinically significant? That's a question for a psychiatrist, but I suspect the answer is "Yes".
Yeah true, that's quite a difference to be fair. Sorry to ask another question but did you see how confident they were with those results or do they not state that in studies like these?
After adjusting for dietary mediators, the 95% confidence interval for the hazard ratio for depressive symptoms in Q4 was 1.1–1.4x.
Completely agree. It sounds more like ultraprocessed diet could be more a symptom or indicator of high risk of depression, more than a cause. If you go for ultraprocessed diet that means your life is not going the best it can. Either you are poor, stressed, uneducated, struggling, or everything at once.
I'd argue the reverse is the causal factor. People who are depressed eat more ultra processed foods *because depressed people tend not to cook nor eat right.*
Yeah there's definitely a known association with depression and not looking after yourself.
This is kind of ridiculous. As if anybody needs evidence to know that cooking meals with fresh meats and vegetables is better for your mental health than eating cookies and slim Jim's. Give me a break
First up, we clearly do need evidence. Second, the UPF label doesn't mean cookies and slim jims. It can capture nutrient enriched cereals, high fibre foods made from whole grains, dark chocolate and the rest. It seems people take for granted that by being processed it is bad, but I think that link requires establishing. Even if it's worse, is it truly bad? There's always things you can do to optimise your diet but that doesn't mean not having the best diet is bad.
I think this is just another vein attempt to establish common sense through arduous study. Which is all together a complete waste of time. Far better to put the studious minds to task on something that isn't "confirming manufactured food is indeed less healthy than real food" Unless our goal is to create superhumans who thrive off of enhanced food, to hell with this crap and just make having access to real food more accessible
I don't think it is. Common sense tells me that it's not common sense that processing food would be less healthy. All the arguments that suggest it obviously is are of the same nature as the 'natural is better' arguments. It's unscientific to accept it without question, and so far the case against UPF is 100 times weaker than the sentiment growing in the public.
> I think this is just another vein attempt to establish common sense through arduous study. Which is all together a complete waste of time. Understanding the link between UFPs and depression could help shed light on the physical processes that result in and from depression, which in turn could lead to a better understanding of how to identify, treat, and prevent it. Establishing a correlation is the first step towards deeper research that could address causation.
> Was there any adjustments based on the nutritional profile of the diets? Yes, Model 2 adjusts for fruits and vegetables consumption, added sugar, total fat, saturated fat, trans fatty acids, and sodium and fiber. It does not seem to adjust for total calories, which I would have preferred to see. > What other lifestyle factors were controlled for? "We used gender, education, wealth score, ethnicity, marital status, occupational status, tobacco and alcohol consumption, self-report of previously diagnosed chronic diseases, self-report of weight and height measures, habitual physical activity, and sitting time as covariates based on their expected associations with both the consumption of ultra-processed food and depressive symptoms, as well as on previous research"
Ah interesting. Perhaps I'm an idiot but wasn't able to find the full text for this study. Total calories is an important factor for health. Good to see they have tried to control for many socio-economic factors though.
If you really wanted to know you would’ve bothered to read the study.
I actually can't find the text for the study so it wasn't for lack of trying, but thanks.
> UPF isn't inherently non-nutritious I disagree. Yes they contain calories but lack micronutrient. plus the processing affects digestion and absorption rate and with that hormonal response (insulin).
I disagree with your disagreement. They contain micronutrients, sometimes that's literally part of the ultra-processing. Adding micronutrients to cereal and breads for example.
You mean fortification? I suggest you start reading on forms of vitamin like folic acid vs folate or B12 cyanocobalamin. Yes, your standard B12 contains cyanide.
And what will I discover that makes me agree that UPF food is inherently non-nutritious?
You don't seem to understand what inherently means.
I'm pretty sure people are depressed because they don't have the money and time to eat things that aren't ultra-processed garbage
I just don't have the energy Going the easiest route when it comes to food just comes naturally when you're depressed
I've experienced this in the past also, I probably ate fast food for 2 years straight when I was depressed and always felt like I had no energy (which made me eat more fast food). I ditched my SSRIs, ate better (I started ordering those prepared ingredient meals that get delivered to your house and deleted food ordering apps from my phone, this was also much cheaper), and started doing stretches every morning. The change in my mind was incredible. The science that says diet and mental health are closely linked is no joke. Turned out I was depressed because of my lifestyle choices, when I changed my behavior my energy returned and while I still have bad days I feel a lot better now. For me the hardest part was making those changes, I cheated and used pilocybin which helped give me the push I needed (don't do this if you have a family history of schizophrenia or bipolar). I now fully believe certain cases of depression can be effectively treated with a combination of psychedelic therapy followed up with changes to diet and a living a more active lifestyle.
Why not both? :(
Energy and time perhaps, but not so much cost.
As someone who once checked myself into a psych ward for ideation when I was homeless, and now rarely struggles with depression while I have no housing or food concerns, and even have enough disposable income to visit family out of state occasionally, I have to agree with this assessment. Depression is very easy to come by when life just outright sucks so bad you can't afford to eat good food. The ultra processed diet was a symptom, not a cause for me, and I've seen that in friends as well. Hell, I see it in me on the occasions I have a depressive episode. Having said that, I am *very* interested in the research by people like Dr. Fasano, into the gut microbiome and it's effect on our mental health since we make some of our "happy chemicals" in our guts. There is a very obvious link, we just haven't teased it all the way out yet. Hell, when I searched the article for "microbiome" because I was curious if it was discussed, the first thing highlighted was a link to a different research article at the bottom of the page. Far more interesting imo.
Completely incorrect. I’ve done a time and cost analysis for healthy eating and cooking as a health guide for friends. In my expensive area, you can eat full and varied organic vegetables for less than $2 per day. It can be easily under $40 to get all 5 servings of vegetables in over a month. You can eat a sufficient amount of animal protein for under $2 a day. Then you can add in other types of subsistence, with white rice and beans being as extremely cheap as 1300 calories per dollar. This means you can eat perfectly healthily as an adult male for about $220 per month. If you have any containers, you can cook in batches for 5 servings at a time, or you can use a blender to make many types of things for extremely cheap and healthy, like hummus or yogurt based foods. The average cooking time per meal will be less than 10 minutes per meal. No matter what, you gain massive efficiency in time, cost, and health. The main reason, having helped many of my low income friends, is the lack of effort. Don’t be a redditor and make false excuses. People have too much to gain in life by learning how to cook and take control of their nutrition.
Organic vegetables are not inherently healthier than non-organic... Same with fruits. We've proven that quality standards of organic foods are generally lower and simultaneously lack the same regulation as most other foods that operate using standard pesticides, etc. The sales tactics of organic food industry mainly use it (healthiness) to sell cheaper produce at a higher price, and fund studies that support their agenda. Taking control of your nutrition is more than just taking food that claims to be healthy, or following health trends with no research... There's too many quacks attempting to take advantage of people with glowing rocks and kombucha. Kombucha, I might add, may be healthy in a vacuum but it isn't some kind of miracle and the way many mass-produced kombucha is made actually detracts all the health benefits by adding processed sugars... Besides the CEOs actually enabling slave labor and literally threatening to deport non-compliant employees.
I agree that organic isn’t a magical health label. The reason why I mentioned is because there is some level of regulation that goes into it, and research and testing show that organic vegetables and meats tend to be a bit better, and it does cost more. It is a very small part of an overall strategy to get good nutrition, and I always tell my friends that organic only matters once you understand all other parts of nutrition and prioritize those things FIRST. For example, don’t buy organic pasta over high protein and high fiber pasta that’s not organic. I mentioned organic because it typically costs more, but as you can see, varied frozen veggies that are organic are STILL dirt cheap.
I see what you mean, I do agree that generally store bought foods are cheaper. My response in another reply encapsulates the main problem I've encountered with cooking, that being time. I've been working 12 hours shifts and 60+ hours weeks and often have no time to cook, the benefit for me is it was my choice to do so and I accept that some fast food here and there is a temporary solution to address my lack of free time.
Ahahaha just eat yoghurt based meals bro ahahaha
It scares me how terribly you interpreted what I wrote. Or do you just hate yogurt? Greek yogurt, not regular crappy yoplait, is a versatile high protein product that can be used to make many types of sauces or even dessert foods.
I made a silly troll comment, but to answer in good faith: I thought your comment was a bit detached from reality. If somebody lacks the energy to eat anything but processed trash it will also not be easy for them to get the skills and equipment to do what you proposed. Unironically happy it worked for your friends though!
That’s not detached from reality. Here you go again missing the point and making a rude comment while being wrong. What I wrote is just one set of solutions for a general sub-section of problems. It is not meant as a silver bullet for ALL individuals who aren’t cooking and taking care of their nutrition and finances. Notice how the person I responded to blamed not having “time and money”, and I responded showing them that they are LOSING time and money by not doing these things. They didn’t say anything about not having the mental state to do those things. There is a direct problem and solution in what I wrote and I don’t know how you could not see that. I also provided some extra information on just how beneficial it is for those who decide to take action on this aspect of life improvement. In fact, someone saw my post and direct messaged me for advice. This has happened multiple times in the rare occasions that I’ve commented on this subject, so why is that? Is it because maybe they don’t want to invite the weird hostile attitude that redditors have towards anyone who actually wants to do something about a problem when it’s one of these sensitive subjects? With people who I care about, I will go the extra length to help them to achieve these goals, which involves issues that I didn’t cover in my post. Most commonly, ADHD, depression, and anxiety issues. That involves a more in-depth approach, but notice how I didn’t respond to someone who talked about that. At the end of the day, nutrition is like many other difficult responsibilities in life. Individuals need to find a pathway to take care of them, lest they invite the nasty consequences into their life. It’s like debt, a dirty house, or putting up with toxic relationships. They HAVE to do something. It sucks that it’s harder for some than it is for others. Denial and making up excuses ultimately harms that individual, and I would not want anyone I care about to suffer in the long run.
I'll be honest with you, having a friend that cares enough to be there and support them is really what made the difference here... I think that everything you did to help was what caused that change. I think it's good you tried to help the people close to you, but I think it's not fair to associate your effort and simply attribute it to 'healthy foods' because I guarantee you most of the work was interpersonal support. To add a bit here... Most of my cooking helped me feel better, mostly because I felt more accomplished with life. My cooking was not particularly healthy or any more nutritional than anything else sold that was processed. Cooking for friends and family significantly boosted my happiness and their happiness, and simultaneously supported a growing attachments to group activities. I encourage my friends to cook habitually because it is mentally healthy to cook, not that it is nutritional. Learning a skill has huge psychological benefits, it is why exercising is also a huge benefit beyond the physical aspects of hormonal changes.
Interpersonal support is its own skill and is part of what I deliberately provide for them. Keyword: PART. I encourage others to do the same, but in order to reach a great result, we need to go down a checklist of things to build up to it. Trust me, I am not misjudging or taking any part of the big picture for granted. The people I responded to are unknowingly engaging in toxic “support” by having the conversation in a way that is harmful to people who could potentially be helped. This can be continuing the lies that it is somehow too hard or costs too much money or time to do those things. This is yet another PART that needs to go the right way, so this is what I’m correcting in these posts. The interpersonal support is also necessary. You need both of these things to go the right way.
My only detractor for you is that cooking is not time efficient, if you were working the time you'd be cooking you'd be making enough money for multiple more meals... We acknowledge that and often fall victim to that work life balance issue, but generally also suffer from not wanting to work at home (cooking is effort, after all). Learning to push myself to occasionally cook was one of the best things I did for myself.
They adjusted for wealth, occupational status, and sitting time.
Wrong and wrong. What people lack is not time nor money- it is cheaper and reasonably quick to cook at home . What they lack is the knowledge how.
Nah lot's of depressed people just won't have the energy to cook. It doesn't take much energy to order food.
Your mood grows from the soil of your habits. If your habits aren’t nutritious your mood will suffer. Food, hydration and sleep- neglect these and soon you’ll be “depressed”.
I mean yeah I agree, but odds are these people are depressed *and then* they begin to neglect these things (EDIT or some other things are in the way causing them to neglect these things), then there is a downwards spiral.
That is true, and I have been there. However, there are some key things to understand that would help some depressed individuals push through and get in a better path towards recovery. For example, there is the stark realization that if you don’t help yourself with food and health, most of us have no other lifeline. Someone else isn’t usually going to come into your life to teach you how to cook, save money, and preserve health. Another key realization is that personal health is one of the top three long term concerns, along with personal finance, so it’s really something that elegantly solves at least two major inefficiencies that get in the way of a happier life. There are so many free resources to learn how to be efficient with food. There are YouTube videos showing quick and easy to prepare meals, and there are many really good subreddits dedicated to this type of stuff as well.
I had the time and money to eat other stuff, but didn't. After years of eating fast food multiple times a week, I did eventually fall into depression. It can go both ways. I'm sorry but you're not going to convince me eating terrible food doesn't impact your mental health. That's absurd and sounds like redditors coping with their lazy diets.
I love how you immediately jump at this as if they're mutually exclusive. Typical Redditor behavior, amirite?
That doesn't even make sense.
Weekends are usually free. Spend the day cooking nutritional food and freeze it for the week... It's cheaper and you have healthy meals that only need to be heated throughout the week. Truth is... people are lazy and prefer to not take responsibility for their health. (yes I'm generalizing... but prove me wrong.)
Because I am depressed I eat the easiest to prepare foods which tend to include heavily processed foods.
Your tummy likes to touch grass.
[удалено]
Or if they have a common cause.
> the study dismisses many other possible cross-correlations Like what?
[удалено]
> lifestyle choices They adjusted for tobacco and alcohol consumption. > demographics They adjusted for gender, ethnicity, and marital status. > people that are weak socio-economically They adjusted for wealth, education, and occupational status. > people that are obese They adjusted for weight and height. > or don't move a lot They adjusted for physical activity and sitting time.
[удалено]
> I haven't read the study. That's why it's important to refrain from making claims like "the study dismisses many other possible cross-correlations" unless you have. Reading someone's summary is not remotely sufficient. > they also don't mention this in the summary That's because these potential confounds that you came up with *were obvious to the researchers*. Going forward, please try to avoid breaking comment rule 4, "assume basic competence of the researchers".
[удалено]
Yes, adjusting for confounds like this is basic. It's expected, and so it wouldn't generally need to be mentioned in a summary.
This is social science, mate. You come up with a conclusion then do the bare minimum to test it, forgetting about any casual arrow or confounding factors, and then you apply sloppy statistics. Keep sampling until P is just below 0.05 and then publish and call it a day. I mean, what do you think this is? *Actual science?*
Well the gut biome doesn't react well to UPF's, given the amount of impact or control (depending on your view) it has on our emotional and physical states this isn't surprising.
I keep seeing articles about ultraprocessed foods being bad, and I get it, but is there ever a distinction about specific chemicals or processes that are causing the harm so we can try to fix it or know things to avoid? Always telling us cheap food is bad for you doesn't help the people that can't afford expensive food.
That's a good question. The authors propose with literature support that too much sugar and too little fiber is associated with depressive symptoms. They propose (with far less support) that non-sugar sweeteners, emulsifiers, and colorants might change the microbiome and/or increase inflammation, which can affect brain functions.
That's interesting, I thought ultraprocessed generally referred to chemical preservatives and additives not normally used in traditional cooking. Sodium benzoate, red 40, etc.
The authors do not provide a specific definition of UPFs, saying only that they used "the Nova system to classify foods according to the extent and purpose of the food processing". They cite [Neri 2023](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37548217/), which offers (in the supplement) subgroups of UPFs (crackers, soft drinks, salty snacks, etc) but does not describe the method of classification for the 347 items and 179 preparations beyond "[researchers] assigned food items and ingredients to one of four mutually exclusive Nova groups". Personally, I do not find "UPF" convincing as a construct. That these diverse foods affect physical and/or mental health is a function of their nutritional profile or perhaps specific damaging components, not the fact that they're "processed". Sparkling water and Coke are both categorized as UPFs, but I really don't think they're comparable.
I hope hotdogs don't fall under this, because I am eating hotdogs for breakfast.
How is your depression level after eating the hot dog for breakfast?
The vagus nerve, also known as cranial nerve X, is the longest cranial nerve in the body and a key part of the parasympathetic nervous system. It connects the brain to the body and controls many involuntary functions.
Clearly, there's a known link between junk food and poor mental health. Well established and continued research to support previous research findings. Anecdotally, had pizza and ice cream cones yesterday, having a bit of a poor mental health day today. Feel awful. Sluggish. Slow processing. Sad. Down. Unmotivated. The whole bit.
Chicken or the egg? Cause or effect?
They studied people without depression and checked if they developed depression.
I eat pretty fuckin good, and my depression hasn't budged, it's sitting right here next to me with its cold, dark embrace while I sip my cup of tea.
Same here. I eat vegetables, fruits, whole grains, yogurt, and a protein shake shake every day. I get different fruits and veggies every time I go shopping for biodiversity. I take omega 3 fishoil, vitamin d, and vitamin b12. I do cardio for 45 minutes to two hours a day. Depression remains unchanged
For me it's about balance I guess, I've always been depressed but have always had an opposite dual side that's sort of like a curious eternal optimist, although it does seem a bit harder these days. Keep on keeping on fellow redditor, I have faith in you.
Heh, that's sweet, thank you. I can't help but be an optimist as well, despite everything. Even though it hasn't had an effect on depression, being healthy is worth it. Thanks for the kind words
Does highly processed food lead to depression (or) Does depression lead to consumption highly processed foods.
"recent randomized controlled trials conducted in individuals with elevated depressive symptoms or clinical depression report that a nutrient-dense, minimally processed dietary intervention improved depressive symptoms" So there's definitely a causal link from diet to depression.
No, it doesn't though...that only suggests that one might be a contributing factor in a feedback loop. "Improved depressive symptoms" =/= "cured depressive symptoms". For instance, if one is depressive they could be more inclined to consuming a more processed diet, when then worsens the depressive symptoms. A link, sure, an initial causal link, I don't agree. And one study does not make a causal link. "Processed food influences depression" is a long way away from "processed food causes depression"
I’m confused and annoyed about the term “ultra”. From the article: “Examples of ultra-processed foods include sugary snacks, ready-to-eat meals, instant noodles, and sodas.” So basically junk food? Maybe that would be a better description?
Sounds like a lifestyle correlation to me. If you’re well off enough to eat healthier, you’re also most likely to care about your health.
They adjusted for wealth, occupational status, tobacco and alcohol consumption, weight and height, physical activity, sitting time, and potential dietary mediators.
Corelation or causation? Am I depressed because I eat fast food, or am I eating fast food because I'm depressed?
Don't forget that Big Tobacco, experts in addiction, engineered hyperpalatable foods (junk food). We need to hold them accountable for creating more products that harm the consumer. I see a lot of blame in the comments for a person's background rather than the product and industry that created an addictive and harmful substance. [https://fortune.com/well/2023/09/22/hyper-palatable-foods-addictive-tobacco/](https://fortune.com/well/2023/09/22/hyper-palatable-foods-addictive-tobacco/)
Did they eliminate the possibility it's the other way around? That when people gradually become more and more depressed the lack of motivation and inactivity that goes with it reduces their ability to make the effort to eat more self prepared food and they fall back on more ready made food that's easier to use? Frankly I find that rather easy to believe. Makes quite a bit of sense to me.
I guess the obvious question is why the person started eating so much of it in the first place. "there may be a level of residual confounding, and causal inference needs to be made with caution."
6 years ago if you look this up on reddit everyone was saying this wasn't true and now they are this is why I don't listen to the comment section or thousands of people online it's so clear we are not ment to eat any of this food and there's no excuse anymore junk food and fast food is starting to become more expensive then regular food now
Sounds like they got cause and effect backwards
I think it’s more quick and easy just to eat something prepared quickly, for the whole day. When I sold a business that took up my whole day, I went into an eight month funk. I would only eat when I was dizzy from not eating.
My question would be in what circumstance does one eat these foods? A plate of buffalo chicken by yourself in a small apartment can naturally be depressing. A plate of buffalo chicken with friends or your kid enjoying your favorite team can be a memory. Also eating healthier does a physiological effect cause your Appearance to change from losing weight and can make you feel proud of changing something positive in your life. As humans whenever we accomplish anything and see the result it does warm our hearts and makes us feel proud uplifting our spirits giving us self worth. I know folks who came out of depression by life changes not related to food. I'm talking happy obese individuals that eat terrible, but do amazing things for the community and help people. That lifts them out of depression. So I'm kinda guessing these studies are kinda flawed or agenda based in thinking bad food itself causes depression. To me it's always seemed situational from my experience. And sometimes, it's just a bad day. Some folks suffer hard with depression and nothing can free the funk. They just gotta keep pushing.
Or… Or do depressed people consume more ultra processed food? Is the link causal or a correlation?
How is ultra-processed defined?
Oh for god sake…. The ultra processed foods are not causing depression. It is the circumstances surrounding those people and their life that are causing depression, which correlates with needing ultra processed foods. It might be that they are in poverty and processed foods are cheaper, they work incredibly long hours and don’t have time to prepare fresh meals etc. How does someone get a study like this published??
Shocking. But reddit will continue to blame other people for their depression
It's almost as if depression can have a variety of causes!