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The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

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Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#121

Post by throw8383833jj »

runlaszlorun wrote: post #23
blakesterz wrote: post #13

"After the diet change, we observed significant changes in measures of anxiety, well-being and happiness, and without changes in gut microbiome diversity. We found strong correlations between greater consumption of fat and protein to lower anxiety and depression, while consuming higher percentages of carbohydrates was associated with increased stress, anxiety, and depression." I think most of us would agree that make…

> I think most of us would agree that makes sense? Eat like crap, feel like crap? I’m just an average joe trying to figure out how to improve a diet, but I haven’t found much of a consensus regarding fats vs proteins vs carbohydrates.

Nutritionists will tell you what really matters is what type of fat/protein/carbohydrate. It's not one or the other. You need to eat plant based whole foods protein, fat and carbs too. For the most part, humans are carbohydrate processing machines (good carbs: like beans, whole grains, fruits, vegetables), these should be your staples.

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#122

Post by sofaygo »

Anecdotally, I agree with the conclusions the researchers propose. From an academic perspective, this study is poorly done, with an abstract that fails to fully encapsulate their findings.

While this is a topic that is very important and deserves the attention,people shouldn’t be mislead into taking this paper at face value.

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#123

Post by eyeundersand »

RugnirViking wrote: post #2

Interesting. Note this has not yet been peer-reviewed, so findings must be taken with an especially large pinch of salt even compared to your average paper. In this case, they only looked at 20 adults over 2 weeks, so I feel that any conclusions drawn here are circumstancial at best. Apparently the reseach was funded by NIH and therefore at least partly the taxpayer. Seems like a bit of a strange study to fund, in my…

This was going to be my comment too. N = 20 is atrocious and that too only over 2 weeks. Think any significant, measurable changes to mental health outcomes would probably take a lot longer than that to manifest. I further find results from any kind of "food recall" surveys (or just surveys in general) hard to believe. Stated vs. revealed preferences/outcomes should be a bigger debate imo.

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#124

Post by snapcaster »

throw8383833jj wrote: post #121
runlaszlorun wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think most of us would agree that makes sense? Eat like crap, feel like crap? I’m just an average joe trying to figure out how to improve a diet, but I haven’t found much of a consensus regarding fats vs proteins vs carbohydrates.

Nutritionists will tell you what really matters is what type of fat/protein/carbohydrate. It's not one or the other. You need to eat plant based whole foods protein, fat and carbs too. For the most part, humans are carbohydrate processing machines (good carbs: like beans, whole grains, fruits, vegetables), these should be your staples.

I disagree with this advice. I think getting carbs as low as you're personally able to and maximizing fat + protein is going to be way more successful

source: me, a guy who lost 50 pounds 5 years ago and hasn't regained it

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#125

Post by DoreenMichele »

Some outtakes:

Bacteroides is predominant in people eating large amounts of protein (e.g. Western diet)

Human studies have shown an increase in gut bacterial translocation in mood disorders.6,7 For example, in major depressive disorder there are significant increases in Bacteroidetes, Proteobacteria, and Actinobacteria and decreases in Firmicutes compared to controls.

The benefits of ketogenic diets for controlling severe epilepsy may be mediated by the gut microbiome, as the effects can be reproduced in animal models by direct manipulation of gut bacterial enterotypes without changing diet.

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#126

Post by snapcaster »

feoren wrote: post #96
stronglikedan wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I improved mine significantly by just cutting out processed foods. Almost everything I eat is made from whole ingredients, and no artificial or "diet" anything. I'm in much better shape, both mentally and physically, because of it. It also helps with portion control, since I'm getting the maximum amount of nutrients from my food, so I don't "feel hungry later".

> processed foods > whole ingredients These are utterly meaningless terms. You "process" food by cutting and cooking it. Everything is processed. Everything is GMO -- have you seen what corn looked like before humans bred it? Everything is organic. Everything is "whole". Nutrition is too complicated and too individualized for these nonsense labels. > I'm getting the maximum amount of nutrients from my food This is ut…

What a weird hill to die on. I think you might be reading more "woo" into the comment you're responding to than is necessary. It's fine if you keep eating your microwaveable factory slop and keep convincing yourself it's identical to cutting a carrot or cooking vegetables but I'm skeptical you'll convince many people of this

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#127

Post by snapcaster »

hombre_fatal wrote: post #57
runlaszlorun wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think most of us would agree that makes sense? Eat like crap, feel like crap? I’m just an average joe trying to figure out how to improve a diet, but I haven’t found much of a consensus regarding fats vs proteins vs carbohydrates.

Minimize saturated fat (by replacing it with unsaturated fat). Get enough protein. Eat healthy carbs*. * On HN and other social media, "carbs" is a euphemism for sugar and cake rather than beans and vegetables, so people will talk about how carbs made them fat when you know they're not talking about slamming back-to-back cans of garbanzos. And don't take any nutrition advice seriously that doesn't break fat apart int…

Did you confuse saturated and unsaturated fat? Saturated fat isn't bad for you and unsaturated fats have some serious issues in how your body uses them. This comment feels like it was posted by someone in 1997

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#128

Post by inglor_cz »

feoren wrote: post #96
stronglikedan wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I improved mine significantly by just cutting out processed foods. Almost everything I eat is made from whole ingredients, and no artificial or "diet" anything. I'm in much better shape, both mentally and physically, because of it. It also helps with portion control, since I'm getting the maximum amount of nutrients from my food, so I don't "feel hungry later".

> processed foods > whole ingredients These are utterly meaningless terms. You "process" food by cutting and cooking it. Everything is processed. Everything is GMO -- have you seen what corn looked like before humans bred it? Everything is organic. Everything is "whole". Nutrition is too complicated and too individualized for these nonsense labels. > I'm getting the maximum amount of nutrients from my food This is ut…

"Stop spreading this bullshit."

Looking at the entirety of your comment, you should really apply this advice to yourself.

Highly processed or ultra-processed food is absolutely a meaningful term. The United Nations published so-called NOVA food classification which divides food into four categories by the amount of processing it received.

Category 4 is what OP was talking about. Industrially processed stuff full of preservatives, artificial coloring, hydrogenated oils, protein isolate, maltodextrin, invert sugar etc. Unlike the other three categories, this sort of industrial processing is a relative newcomer, it wasn't even a thing 100 or 150 years ago, so it is entirely plausible that our guts and our gut biome may not be happy about it.

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#129

Post by throwawaaarrgh »

Last year, I went on a diet of only strawberry flavored candy peeps. I lost 50 lbs, my skin cleared up, and I feel like I have more energy. Clearly an all candy diet is something we need more research on, as it seems the status quo is to undersell the advantages of this high sucrose diet.

Disclaimer: I now have Type 2 diabetes.

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#130

Post by snapcaster »

darthrupert wrote: post #42
augment003 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it? I haven’t seen any controversy around it, just a gradual shift to recommendations for more protein and fat vs less carbs.

I haven't heard of any such thing, except made by people who are selling something.

Did you talk to anyone who successfully lost weight and kept it off? I have, and from my own experience and talking to others who did the same _every_ single person succeeded via low card high protein/fat. Would be super interested in meeting someone who lost weight with a high carb diet and how they pulled it off. It's really hard for a lot of psychological and hunger based reasons which is why basically nobody can do it
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