Most of us know that we need vitamin D for strong bones. Now it appears researchers have identified a relationship between vitamin D levels and an individual’s risk of depression.
The finding comes from a four-year cross-sectional study of more than 12,000 participants conducted by researchers at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, who reported their findings in the Mayo Clinic Proceedings. Depression was assessed with the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D). Data pointed to a decreased risk of current depression in those with the highest vitamin D levels. The association was strongest in subjects with a history of depression. The researchers urge assessment of vitamin D levels in primary care patients who have a history of depression.
Depression isn’t the only mental illness associated with vitamin D levels. Psychiatric News has reported on a link between vitamin D levels in newborns and risk of developing schizophrenia. Click here to read that article.
Britain's PM David Cameron has spent 2 million pounds in a project to measure wellbeing and happiness in the UK.
Today Isabel Oakeshott writes in the Sunday Times
"The report which is due to be released to coincide with "Blue-Monday" tomorrow, has concluded that David Cameron’s strategy of measuring and explicitly promoting happiness over other objectives is a waste of time.
Drawing from an array of data from 126 countries, the 250-page report by the free-market think tank the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) finds that the most important indicator of happiness is wealth, and says the government should forget general wellbeing and concentrate on boosting Britain’s flatlining GDP".
Hum,interestingly enough researchers from the University of Warwick, highlighted how relatively ineffective extra income is at raising well-being. The researchers further drew on two striking pieces of independent evidence to illustrate their point – over the last 50 years developed countries have not seen any increases to national happiness in spite of huge economic gains. Mental health on the other hand appears to be deteriorating worldwide. The researchers argue that resources should be directed towards the things that have the best chance of improving the health and happiness of our nations – investment in mental health care by increasing the access and availability of psychological therapy could be a more effective way of improving national well-being than the pursuit of income growth.
A hotter home appears to produce babies with better cognitive abilities – but before you turn up the home heater to make your baby brainier, the research was conducted on the Australian lizard Bassiana duperreyi by researchers from the University of Sydney.
Many traits in young reptiles are determined by the temperature of the nest, so Joshua Amiel, a PhD student in the School of Biological Sciences, and his supervisor, Professor Rick Shine, looked at how incubation temperature would affect the learning performance of these lizards.
Published in the UK’s Royal Society journal Biology Letters, the research found that lizard eggs incubated at higher temperatures resulted in baby lizards with enhanced learning performance. [continue reading…]
