Trial reportNutrients2021
Cocoa Flavanols Improve Vascular Responses to Acute Mental Stress in Young Healthy Adults.
Trial report in Nutrients, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
14 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 35 citations in OpenAlex.
- Effects of Dietary Flavonoids on Mood and Mental Health: A Systematic Review.Nutrition reviews · 2026Pooled it
- The role of cocoa flavanols in modulating peripheral and cerebral microvascular function in healthy individuals and populations at-risk of cardiovascular disease: a systematic review.Nutrition journal · 2025Pooled it
- Comparable improvements in selective, but not sustained, attention in response to a multi-ingredient nootropic formulation when compared with caffeine.European journal of nutrition · 2026Trial
- Dietary flavanols preserve upper- and lower-limb endothelial function during sitting in high- and low-fit young healthy males.The Journal of physiology · 2026Trial
- Short-term cocoa bioflavanol supplementation does not improve cold-induced vasodilation in young healthy adults.European journal of applied physiology · 2024Trial
- The Impact of Purple-Flesh Potato (Nutrients · 2022Trial
- Epigenetic Modulation of Exercise Adaptation: The Role of Dietary Supplementation in Athletic Performance.Genes · 2026Review
- The acute effects of Zensera™ (Therapeutic advances in psychopharmacology · 2026Article
- Beneficial Effects of Cocoa Flavanols on Microvascular Responses in Young Men May Be Dependent on Ethnicity and Lifestyle.Nutrients · 2024Article
- NOX2 as a Biomarker of Academic Performance: Evidence from University Students during Examination.Antioxidants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Article
- Can Chocolate Be Classified as an Ultra-Processed Food? A Short Review on Processing and Health Aspects to Help Answer This Question.Foods (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Review
- Fat intake impairs the recovery of endothelial function following mental stress in young healthy adults.Frontiers in nutrition · 2023Article
- From Cocoa to Chocolate: Effect of Processing on Flavanols and Methylxanthines and Their Mechanisms of Action.International journal of molecular sciences · 2022Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Mental stress has been shown to induce cardiovascular events, likely due to its negative impact on vascular function. Flavanols, plant-derived polyphenolic compounds, improve endothelial function and blood pressure (BP) in humans, however their effects during stress are not known. This study examined the effects of acute intake of cocoa flavanols on stress-induced changes on vascular function. In a randomised, controlled, double-blind, cross-over intervention study, 30 healthy men ingested a cocoa flavanol beverage (high-flavanol: 150 mg vs. low-flavanol < 4 mg (-)-epicatechin) 1.5 h before an 8-min mental stress task). Forearm blood flow (FBF), BP, and cardiovascular activity were assessed pre- and post-intervention, both at rest and during stress. Endothelial function (brachial flow-mediated dilatation, FMD) and brachial BP were measured before the intervention and 30 and 90 min post-stress. FMD was impaired 30 min post-stress, yet high-flavanol cocoa attenuated this decline and remained significantly higher compared to low-flavanol cocoa at 90 min post-stress. High-flavanol cocoa increased FBF at rest and during stress. Stress-induced cardiovascular and BP responses were similar in both conditions. Flavanols are effective at counteracting mental stress-induced endothelial dysfunction and improving peripheral blood flow during stress. These findings suggest the use of flavanol-rich dietary strategies to protect vascular health during stress.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What Socratic holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.