Cocoa makes you smart - but not everyone

Research is an arduous business. First, a lot of time is spent on a sophisticated study design, test subjects are recruited, the study is conducted over years and the results are analysed. And then? It often turns out that the hypothesis put forward cannot be upheld.

Cocoa against cancer and cardiovascular disease?

This is roughly what happened to the food manufacturer Mars, which was involved in the large-scale "COcoa Supplement and Multivitamin Outcomes Study", or COSMOS-Web-Study, Mars examined whether flavanol capsules made from cocoa extract can protect senior citizens from cancer and cardiovascular disease. Flavanol is a secondary plant substance that is said to have health-promoting properties. For the study, 21,000 women aged 65 and over and men aged 60 and over were randomly allocated to a placebo group and a cocoa group. After four years of research, the results are sobering: taking flavanols does not reduce the risk of cancer or cardiovascular disease. Authorisation as a preparation for the prevention of these diseases was rejected. A lot of work for nothing, then?

Increased cognitive performance in seniors

Not necessarily, because: If researchers were to give up at this point, new findings would probably rarely be made at all. If the expected effect does not materialise, other effects may become apparent. In this case, there was a sub-study in which around 3,500 of the test subjects were examined for an improvement in their cognitive performance as a result of flavanol intake. If cocoa doesn't help against cancer and cardiovascular disease, perhaps it at least makes you smarter? No, here too the differences compared to taking a placebo were not sufficient for authorisation. So it's all for nothing after all?

Not yet. Scientific research can sometimes degenerate into detective work. If such large amounts of data are collected as in the COSMOS study, it can be worthwhile to look for patterns in the results retrospectively. This can reveal possible correlations that only become visible when looking at certain groups or under certain conditions.

Cocoa can help those who previously lacked flavanols

And so it was with the flavanols: The scientists examined the data to see how high the subjects' flavanol intake was from their usual diet. And lo and behold, they found what they were looking for. Looking only at the group of people who consume few flavanols in their normal diet, flavanol supplementation led to a 16 per cent improvement in the cognition test. This improvement in cognition was also subsequently maintained, although it could not be further increased by continued intake.

Cocoa can therefore make people smarter, but only those who previously consumed hardly any flavanols. However, this finding does not give the food manufacturer any authorisation for the time being. As the data from the randomised study was evaluated retrospectively, the new publication is not considered a proven benefit. In order to achieve this, a completely new study would be necessary in which subjects with flavanol deficiency are randomised (i.e. randomly assigned) to receive a placebo or flavanol capsules.

If you are now craving cocoa, regardless of the possible health benefits, here is a random selection of cocoa drinks:

Cocoa

vegalife Organic cocoa powder

125 g

3

Cocoa

Ovomaltine Cocoa powder

500 g

6

Cocoa

Lindt Drinking chocolate milk

300 g

15

Here you can find all the cocoa drinks in our range.

It doesn't necessarily have to be cocoa: Apples and berries also help

The fact that the food manufacturer Mars focussed the entire study on cocoa is probably due more to its own market interests than to cocoa itself. You can also get enough flavanols from apples, berries, grapes and black and green tea. A healthy diet would make taking capsules superfluous.

An additional analysis of the COSMOS study also showed that multivitamins can slow down the decline in cognitive performance in old age. The participants were given either a multivitamin or a placebo. The multivitamin group performed significantly better in the memory test than the placebo control group. According to the researchers, the multivitamins prevented about as much as three years of age-related memory changes.