Trial reportNutrients2022
The Effects of Walnuts and Academic Stress on Mental Health, General Well-Being and the Gut Microbiota in a Sample of University Students: A Randomised Clinical Trial.
Trial report in Nutrients, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 9 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
9 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 19 citations in OpenAlex.
- Effects of Dietary Flavonoids on Mood and Mental Health: A Systematic Review.Nutrition reviews · 2026Pooled it
- Effects of Nut Intake on Gut Microbiome Composition and Gut Function in Adults: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.Advances in nutrition (Bethesda, Md.) · 2025Pooled it
- Nuts4Brain-RCT: Protocol for a Three-Arm Randomized Controlled Trial Examining the Dose-Response Effects of Nut Consumption on Mental Health in Young Adults.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Effects of Walnut Consumption on Blood Lipid Profile and Apolipoproteins in Adults: A GRADE-Assessed Systematic Review and Dose-Response Meta-Analysis of 49 Randomized Controlled Trials.Food science & nutrition · 2026Review
- Gut-Brain Axis and Brain Microbiome Interactions from a Medical Perspective.Brain sciences · 2025Review
- Feeding gut microbes to nourish the brain: unravelling the diet-microbiota-gut-brain axis.Nature metabolism · 2024Review
- Perspective: Challenges and Future Directions in Clinical Research with Nuts and Berries.Advances in nutrition (Bethesda, Md.) · 2023Article
- Assessing brain function in stressed healthy individuals following the use of a combination of green tea, Rhodiola, magnesium, and B vitamins: an fMRI study.Frontiers in nutrition · 2023Article
- Academic performance and mental health among Chinese middle and high school students after the lifting of COVID-19 restrictions.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Poorer mental health is common in undergraduate students due to academic stress. An interplay between stress and diet exists, with stress influencing food choices. Nutritional interventions may be effective in preventing mental health decline due to complex bidirectional interactions between the brain, the gut and the gut microbiota. Previous studies have shown walnut consumption has a positive effect on mental health. Here, using a randomized clinical trial (Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry, #ACTRN12619000972123), we aimed to investigate the effects of academic stress and daily walnut consumption in university students on mental health, biochemical markers of general health, and the gut microbiota. We found academic stress had a negative impact on self-reported mood and mental health status, while daily walnut consumption improved mental health indicators and protected against some of the negative effects of academic stress on metabolic and stress biomarkers. Academic stress was associated with lower gut microbial diversity in females, which was improved by walnut consumption. The effects of academic stress or walnut consumption in male participants could not be established due to small numbers of participants. Thus, walnut consumption may have a protective effect against some of the negative impacts of academic stress, however sex-dependent mechanisms require further study.
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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.