Although yogurt is often eaten in hopes of losing weight or improving bone strength, a new study involving more than 4,000 people found that there is not a link between regular yogurt intake and physical health improvements.
The study, which was conducted in Spain, evaluated whether there was a link between physical and mental improvement in health-related quality of life and regular yogurt consumption. Lead author Esther Lopez-Garcia of Autonomous University in Madrid said that consuming yogurt regularly is not associated with better “health-related quality of life.” She added that “more specific instruments” should be used in future studies to increase the probability of finding potential benefits of yogurt.
The study published in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics took three and a half years to complete and included 4,445 Spanish adults over the age of 18. The participants consumed about six servings of yogurt each week.
Lopez-Garcia noted that although there was no significant physical health difference in people who regularly consumed yogurt and those who did not, there was a slight improvement in mental health. However, the difference was not “statistically significant.”
According to the U.S. Center of Disease Control and Prevention, quality of life linked to quality health must have “aspects of overall quality of life that can be clearly shown to affect health – either physical or mental.” This can involve health conditions along with socioeconomic status and support, according to Medical News Today.
People around the globe have believed that the consumption of yogurt and other dairy products because of their high calcium content–good for strengthening and protecting bones against debilitating diseases. Other research has even associated yogurt with health benefits such as lower risk of type 2 diabetes.
But Lopez-Garcia claims this is because most studies have been focusing on the “effect as a whole.” She thinks that it would be interesting to assess the “independent association between each type of product and global health indicators.”
