To Your Health
August, 2015 (Vol. 09, Issue 08)
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Your Kids Need Omega-3s

By Editorial Staff

Are behavioral issues straining your relationship with your child? While no child is the perfect angel every day (no matter what their doting parents think / say), some children exhibit more severe issues than others. The good news, according to a recent study, is that a simple nutritional strategy may be the solution.

The study, published in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, divided children (ages 8-16) into two groups for comparison: a treatment group given a fruit drink containing 1 gram of omega-3 fatty acids once daily for six months; and a placebo group given the same fruit drink, but without omega-3s, at the same frequency / time period.

According to researchers involved in the study, "findings provide initial evidence that omega-3 supplementation can produce sustained reductions in externalizing and internalizing behavior problems." interestingly, parents whose children took the omega-3 drink also showed improvements in their own antisocial / aggressive behavior, suggesting that improvements in child behavior can have a positive impact on caregiver behavior (and/or vice versa, by the way).