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Saturday, December 4, 2010

Anger Can Be Controlled By a Spoonful of Sugar


Researchers have found that higher levels of sugar can help in controlling anger and can prevent temper loss. In their study more than sixty college students fasted for three hours to decrease instability of glucose. Then all the participants were asked to participate in a taste test study.
Their response time was measured in computerized test against their opponents. Among all participants, half were provided with lemonade sweetened with sugar, whereas others were provided with lemonade with substitute of sugar. After wait for eight minutes, which permit glucose to be mixed in the bloodstream, they took part in the reaction test.
All the participants were asked to press a button with their unseen partner as fast as in twenty-five trials. Whoever was slower received a blast of white noise through their headphones. At the start of every trial, participants fix the levels of noise which their partner would acquire, if they were slower.
The sound was rated on a scale of one to ten from sixty decibels to one hundred and five decibels. Every participant won twelve out of twenty-five trails. Aggression was evaluated by intensity of noise that participant opt on first trail prior to provoke by their partner.
The results showed that participants who drank the lemonade sweetened with sugar behaved less aggressively than those who drank lemonade with a sugar substitute.
Those who drank the sugar-sweetened drink chose a noise level averaging five out of ten, while those with the sugar substitute averaged six.
According to study co-researcher Prof Brad Bushman, drinking sweetened lemonade can help in providing short term energy, required to prevent lashing out at others. The main problem is that the number of people having problem of metabolizing glucose is rising speedily. This is the first study to find that boosting glucose levels can diminish actual aggressive behavior.

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