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Chocolate helps reduce stress

By Anna Archibald

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

“Americans consume 100 lbs of chocolate every second,” reads a sign sitting on the chocolate display at Penny Annie’s Sweet Shoppe, 845 Massachusetts St.

Despite that seemingly stomach-churning number, indulging in some types of chocolate can actually be good for you — in moderation. On November 11, the American Chemical Society’s Journal of Proteome Research published a study that said eating 1.4 ounces of dark chocolate a day for two weeks reduced the levels of stress hormones in people who were reportedly highly stressed.

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Photo by Adam Buhler

Summer Brooks, adds more delicious dark chocolate to the scale at Penny Annie's Monday afternoon. Penny Annie's has found their dark chocolates to be a hot item with recent research pointing to its health benefits.

This is some of the first conclusive evidence to suggest that one of America’s most popular candies may actually reduce stress. It also said the treat partially corrected other stress-related biochemical imbalances.

With finals week approaching, Austin Schauer, Topeka freshman, plans on testing the study himself.

“I tend to binge eat when I get really stressed,” Schauer said. “I eat a lot of Easy Mac and chocolate. The Snickers’ dark chocolate is really good.”

Monica Istas, owner of Penny Annie’s, said the bittersweet treat had been the new hot item in the chocolate display over the past couple of years because it had been mentioned in so many medical journals.

“The higher the percent of cocoa in the chocolate, the better it is for you,” Istas said, explaining that many types of dark chocolate have different percentages of cocoa. “I’ve probably been eating a lot more dark chocolate myself and will definitely give it a shot at lowering my stress levels. It seems like it’s more of a natural instinct to eat when it gets colder, anyway, and chocolate is a go-to.”

Based on the study’s findings, if students eat the equivalent of seven foil-wrapped chocolate balls, approximately 1.4 ounces of candy, for two weeks, their stress levels could be slightly lower by finals week.

Brandon Steinkuhler, St. Louis junior, is an employee at Penny Annie’s. He said his favorite candies were the chocolate covered peanuts and the truffles.

“I get to eat all of the chocolate I want while I’m working,” he said. “My friends like it, too, when I get to take chocolate back home.”

Ann Chapman, coordinator of nutrition services at Watkins Health Center, said the biggest problem with this finding was people’s tendency to over-indulge in chocolate after hearing findings such as these.

“If you’re consuming excess calories every day in any form it’s not good,” Chapman said. “Although there is some research that the antioxidants in chocolate are good for you, not all of the fat in chocolate is good fat.”

She said excessive eating was common during the holiday season, especially considering the fast approach of finals.

“Small amounts of dark chocolate may be good for us,” she said. “That’s my take. But at the end of these studies, there is always the warning that consumers need to be careful and more studies need to be done to reinforce this.”

She said students either tended to overeat or undereat around finals time because of the stress they experience.

“Going into finals, try to snack on healthier foods and not just on potato chips or candy bars,” Chapman said. “A piece of chocolate no bigger than one of the little Dove bites can be good.”

Savannah Rose, Great Bend graduate student, said she always ate the dark chocolate out of the Hershey’s variety bags, but said she didn’t think she would eat chocolate to relieve her finals stress.

“I tend to not eat as much when I’m stressed,” she said. “I imagine I will find other ways to de-stress that are better for me.”

— Edited by Abby Olcese

Comments

Chocolate helps reduce stress

Bravo!

Chocolate helps reduce stress

dude, did you even read what the story was actually about???

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