Stressed? Have a cup of tea

Scientists are now telling us what the ‘old wives’ knew all along: tea drinking helps stress recovery.

A study using 75 healthy young men found that after six weeks of tea drinking, they physically recovered from stress-inducing situations more quickly than those drinking a placebo.

50 minutes after each stress-inducing task, cortisol levels in the tea drinking group had dropped by 47%, compared to only 27% in the placebo group, and they also reported feeling more relaxed. (At HFG we can’t help wondering though, what would a 'placebo tea' taste like?)

Source: Psychopharmacology, published online 30 September 2006