What You Eat Affects What You Do

There’s been much noise about omega-3 fatty acids vs. omega-6 fatty acids. The omega-3s are the ones found in salmon and so on, and we aren’t eating as much of them as our ancestors used to. The ratio of omega-3 to omega-6 intake has declined, and many diseases have been linked to this – heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer’s, and diabetes, just for a start. Evidence from good clinical studies is slowly coming in to prove or disprove these theories.

Researches at NIH have been following another track. They found some years ago that the rate of homicide in different countries is closely linked to the consumption of linoleic acid in the country. Linoleic acid is an omega-6 fatty acid, found in seed oils (soy, canola, corn), and too much upsets the omega-3 omega-6 ratio. .

Some sort of corroboration for this role of the ratio of omega-3 to omega-6 in our diets comes from a British study, where feeding prisoners supplements containing omega-3s reduced the level of antisocial behavior, including violence. It really seems possible that what you eat affects what you do or how you behave. Maybe we should be making more omega-3 capsules for our troops to distribute in the Middle East . . . .

Comments

[Robert Griffith]

The recent death of the attorney who defended the murderer of Harvey Milk, who used the "Twinky Defence" to defend him, set me thinking. Maybe, indeed, too many Twinkies represented too few omega3s and too many other nutrients (including omega-6s), pushing the accused into a more violent frame of mind. Just a thought . . . Science is catching up with history!