Chips make you chipper: Official

Fried spuds alleviate effects of Hiroshima fallout

By Lester Haines • 

15th February 2010 12:54 GMT

It's official: if you're feeling a bit down in the dumps, then filling your face with chips will cheer you up, according to boffins at Aston University’s School of Life and Health Sciences.
The team, led by Dr Mike Green, showed 60 adults a short film on the aftermath of the Hiroshima atom bomb, which unsurprisingly induced "mild dysphoria".


Half were then given chips, and reported "a 10 and 13 per cent increase in calmness and cheerfulness respectively" as well as an "eight per cent decrease in anxiety after eating chips".
Green explained: “The consumption of chips clearly improved respondents’ mood. The psychological data showed that participants who were feeling down felt better after eating chips. In fact, calmness was restored within twenty minutes.”
Quite what gives chips this magical power is uncertain. Green offered: “There are a number of possible nutritional and psychological mechanisms which could explain the mood changes after eating chips. It may be down to the biological effects of nutritional components on brain chemistry, or simply a pleasurable oro-stimulatory sensation, triggered by the way chips taste.”
The research was commissioned by The Potato Council - the one-stop shop for all your tuber needs, including the Love Chips website where you can find more on the dysphoria-busting spud-based nosh. ®



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