What are the effects?
Are you feeling tired or depressed? You’ve all seen the adverts on TV for pick-me-ups perhaps in the late afternoon: eat a biscuit, chocolate bar or other source of sugar. These adverts rely on people’s belief that a resulting increase in blood glucose levels will give you a mental boost, that it will make you feel good and make you more alert. Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be the case.There have been many studies of the effects of these different meal patterns and different foods. Some tested and measured subjective things such as fatigue, vigour, anger, hostility, confusion, anxiety and depression. In all of these tests, those who ate carbohydrate meals reported worse scores in all classes except anxiety, where there was no difference. In other, objective tests of alertness, auditory and visual reaction times, and vigilance, carbohydrate eaters again came off worse.
There is certainly evidence that the taking of sugar or other carbohydrate foods has the ability to improve your mood. The role that glucose is known to play in supplying the cells of the body with energy, has led to the assumption that an enhanced supply of metabolic energy is associated with feeling subjectively more alert and energetic. But in fact, much of the evidence is that consuming carbohydrate has a hypnotic effect. In other words, it makes you feel good by making you more relaxed and sleepy, rather than more alert. This is the reason why many dieticians recommend a carbohydrate meal in the evening – it helps you sleep.
Which is the last thing you need if you are driving, trying to get a job done efficiently, or taking part in a tournament.
See also The correct nutrition for athletes a larger, more detailed article.
