6 ms·
Interesting. Note this has not yet been peer-reviewed, so findings must be taken with an especially large pinch of salt even compared to your average paper. In
by RugnirViking 4y ago
Interesting. Note this has not yet been peer-reviewed, so findings must be taken with an especially large pinch of salt even compared to your average paper. In this case, they only looked at 20 adults over 2 weeks, so I feel that any conclusions drawn here are circumstancial at best.
Apparently the reseach was funded by NIH and therefore at least partly the taxpayer. Seems like a bit of a strange study to fund, in my opinion nothing useful can possibly result from such a tiny study. I tried tracking down the specific grant they were given (they mention NIH award UL1 TR-002378 in the disclosure section of the paper but I can't find anything from that)
- kevviiinn 4y agoMost grants fund large projects out of which smaller papers are written. I don't think any grant is funding individual papers like you seem to imply
- peebz 4y agoDon't go too heavy on the salt.
- RugnirViking 4y agoI suppose without further research we won't have any clue what effect salt will or won't have on my emotional state ;) But seriously, there is pretty much no point discussing the conclusions of such a deeply flawed paper.
- c_elegant 4y ago> Some limitations to this study beyond the subjective nature of the term “mood,” are compliance with following the study protocol, lack of exact control over the first and final diets, and uBiome’s bankruptcy that limited sample size further than expected. This is what you're looking for: it's a pilot study seeded by now-disgraced/bankrupt uBiome.
- salamanderman 4y agoThis should be the top comment.
- robwwilliams 4y agoAbsolutely right. This is not even a proper pilot study.
- eyeundersand 4y agoThis was going to be my comment too. N = 20 is atrocious and that too only over 2 weeks. Think any significant, measurable changes to mental health outcomes would probably take a lot longer than that to manifest. I further find results from any kind of "food recall" surveys (or just surveys in general) hard to believe. Stated vs. revealed preferences/outcomes should be a bigger debate imo.
- mtrpcic 4y agoAny major changes to gut biome will definitely take more than two weeks. Anyone who has ever had to do an elimination diet will tell you that it can take 4 to 6 weeks for things to normalize when making dietary changes.