The Myth Behind the Sugar Rush
Ask almost anyone about giving their kids candy, an you’ll hear horror stories of kids becoming hyperactive and bounding of the walls with a sugar rush. Granted, kids really shouldn’t be eating a lot of candy, but sugar rushes and hyperactivity aren’t why. In fact, the idea of sugar causing kids to become hyper isn’t even true!
Simple sugars, like dextrose and fructose, do produce short-term energy, for both adults and children. There is, however, no evidence to back up the idea that this short-term energy boost will result in hyperactivity. More than twenty studies have been performed to determine a difference in children’s behavior before and after ingesting the simple sugars found in candy, cake, soda, and other foods parents blame for making kids act up, and no correlation was found between the two. Better yet, it didn’t seem to matter how old the children in question were, how much sugar they ingested, what form it took, or what kind of diets they normally followed, sugar didn’t equate to hyperactivity. So, if science continues to insist that eating sugar doesn’t equate to a rush, why does this old wives’ tale persist?
For one, children are very perceptive of their parents’ behavior. If parents believe that giving a kid sugar is going to result in hyperactivity or misbehavior, they’re going to betray that every time the child is given sugar, whether it’s subconsciously (by their actions or body language) or consciously (by cracking jokes about it). Kids pick up on this kind of thing, which could very well lead to sugar having a hyperactivity-causing placebo effect.
Another factor that needs to be considered is the kind of situations during which kids generally end up eating a lot of sugar. Most children aren’t given candy, cake, soda, or other very sugary snacks every day, they’re usually reserved for birthdays, parties, holidays, or other festive occasions where there’s a lot of excitement, other children, games, and other situations that can cause kids to be more energetic, and possibly act up more than they would otherwise. In this case, even without sugary snacks, their behavior would likely be the same.
Though avoiding excess sugar is ultimately far better for kids than letting them eat as much as they want, it’s still important for parents to understand that sugar isn’t to blame for a child’s misbehavior or hyperactivity. Allowing kids to have a sugary snack as a very occasional treat is less harmful than the ways sugar sneaks into their diets otherwise- through bread, pasta sauce, and other foods most people wouldn’t expect to contain a lot of it. By providing a freshly-prepared, all-natural diet, parents can ensure that their children are getting optimal nutrition, while still allowing them to have an occasional piece of candy or slice of cake.
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