Hello. This is 6 Minute English from
BBC Learning English. I’m Sam.
And I’m Rob.
When someone feels sad or in a bad mood,
they often try to feel better by eating their favourite food…
I usually go for a peanut butter sandwich myself.
Do you have a favourite comfort food, Rob?
Hmm, maybe a cream chocolate éclair…
Comfort food is a type of emotional eating –
eating lots of food because we feel sad, not
because we’re hungry. But unfortunately, most
comfort food is high in carbohydrates and sugar
and, after a few minutes, it leaves us feeling even
worse than before.
Today, scientific research into the relationship
between what we eat and how we feel is growing.
In this programme we’ll be investigating the
connection between our food and our mood.
We’ll hear how healthy eating makes us feel
better, and of course, we’ll be learning some
new vocabulary as well.
Great! But first I have a question for you, Sam
People who link what we eat with how we
feel make a simple argument: the food you
eat supplies nutrients and energy to the brain,
and the brain controls our emotions.
Now, that might sound simplistic, but the brain is a
vital link in the connection between food and
our mood. So, Sam, my question is: how much
of the body’s total energy is used up by the brain? Is it:
a) 10 percent, b) 20 percent, or c) 30 percent?
Hmmm, that's a good question. I’ll say it’s a) 10 percent.
Right. Well, I’ll reveal the answer later
in the programme. Emotional eating is
often caused by feelings of depression,
anxiety or stress. Chef Danny Edwards,
who has suffered with depression, works
in one of the most stressful places imaginable -
a busy restaurant kitchen. BBC World Service
programme, The Food Chain, asked Danny
about his eating habits at work:
Actually, when you’re working in a kitchen
environment for long periods, your appetite
can become suppressed because you sometimes
don't want to eat, or you don't feel like you can
stop and eat, and all of that. So, it very often is
grabbing something on the go which obviously,
as we know, is not great for us… So you go for something
that’s quick, so hence why a lot of chefs have quite a bad diet.
Even though he’s surrounded by food, Danny
says that working under stress actually decreases
his appetite – the feeling that you want to eat food.
In a busy kitchen there’s no time for a sit-down meal,
so Danny has to grab and go – take something quickly
because he doesn’t have much time, although
he knows this isn’t very healthy.
So when even chefs have a difficult relationship
with food, what about the rest of us? Professor Felice Jacka,
is an expert in nutritional psychiatry. She studied the effect of
eating a healthy diet – food such as fresh fruit and
vegetables, wholegrain cereals, and olive oil – on people
suffering depression. Professor Jacka found that the patients
whose mental health improved were the same patients who
had also improved their diet.
But Professor Jacka’s ideas were not
accepted by everyone. Here, she explains to
Jordan Dunbar, presenter of BBC World Service’s,
The Food Chain, about the opposition her study
faced from other doctors:
So I proposed to do this for my PhD study, and everyone
thought I was a bit bananas, you know, and there was quite a
bit of, I guess, eye rolling maybe. I'm not surprised by that
because the discipline of psychiatry
was very medication and brain focused. What did people say
in the field? Were they sceptical? Oh, hugely sceptical
and sometimes very patronising. But this again comes from the
fact that general practitioners, psychiatrists, medical specialists
get almost no nutrition training through all those years of study.
When Professor Jacka investigated the link between food and
mood, her colleagues thought she was bananas – a slang
word meaning silly or crazy. They rolled their eyes – a phrase
which describes the gesture of turning your eyes upwards to
express annoyance, boredom or disbelief.
Other colleagues were patronising – they behaved towards her
as if she were stupid or unimportant. Professor Jacka thinks
this is because most doctors have little or no training about
nutrition and the effect of food on mental health. But her
ground-breaking research, named ‘The Smile Trial’, has been
successfully repeated elsewhere, clearly showing the link
between eating well and feeling good.
So, the next time you’re feeling down and your brain is calling
out for a donut, you might be better eating an apple instead!
And speaking of brains, Sam, it’s time to
reveal the answer to my question.
Yes, you asked me how much of the body’s energy
is used up by the brain. And I guessed it was ten percent…
Well, I’m afraid you are wrong. In fact, around
20 percent of the body’s energy goes to feeding the brain,
even though it only makes up two percent of our total body
weight. OK, let’s recap the vocabulary we’ve learned from our
discussion about emotional eating - that's eating too much food
because of how you feel, not because you’re hungry.
Appetite is the desire to eat food.
If you grab and go, you take something quickly
because you don’t have much time. Calling someone bananas is
slang for silly or crazy. If you roll your eyes,
you move your eyes upwards to show you feel annoyed, bored or
don’t believe what someone is telling you. And finally, if
someone is patronising you, they speak or behave towards you
as if you were stupid or unimportant.
That's the end of our programme. Don’t forget to join us
again soon for more topical discussion and useful vocabulary
here at 6 Minute English. Bye, everyone!
Bye!