Is cooking the secret ingredient to living stress-free?

food drink

by caroline mccarthy

Seven out of 10 Americans consider cooking and eating to be their sixth “love language.”

A survey of 2,000 Americans who cook regularly found that 80% use food as a way to comfort themselves after a stressful day, and 65% plan to use food as a way to comfort others. It became clear that.

The top comfort food was ice cream (34%), followed closely by pizza (31%), pasta (24%), hamburgers (22%), and grilled cheese (19%).

More than three-quarters (78%) agree that cooking is a calming activity, ranking it second among activities they do when they need to de-stress (65%) More than twice as likely to: Cleaning (31%).

Others take on household chores to reduce stress, such as gardening (30%), doing laundry (25%), or folding laundry (23%).

The survey, commissioned by Noom and conducted by OnePoll, found that 90% of people feel some degree of stress by the end of the day. More than a quarter (28%) said they “always” or “often” feel stressed at the end of the day.

People feel that stress at the end of the day is most often caused by work (40%), to-do lists (32%) and social life (28%).

This may explain why 89% say feeling mentally well is important to them, and 81% try to make sure they're stress-free and worry-free before going to bed. yeah.

Four out of five people find themselves reflecting on their day at least occasionally while performing daily tasks they enjoy, but are more likely to reflect on tasks that reduce stress. got it.

Respondents said they enjoy doing tasks such as cooking (80%), cleaning (43%), doing laundry (41%), gardening (39%), and folding laundry (34%).

“It's easy to find that tasks like cooking can be therapeutic and relaxing,” says Dr. Andreas Michaelides, head of psychology at Noom. “It's a way to focus on one task, practice self-reflection, and create something positive that nourishes yourself and makes you feel good.”

Research shows that the most effective ways to relieve stress at the end of the day are listening to music (35%), watching TV (34%), taking a bath or shower (34%), and eating a comforting meal. (23%). %) or self-catering (21%).

With 1 in 5 people turning to social feeds to relieve stress, respondents also shared the types of social media videos they felt were beneficial or harmful to their mental health: Cooking videos (85% ), animal videos (76%), and music videos (72%) were all informative.

Two in three people (65%) find food-related media, such as cooking shows and videos, relaxing, and one-third use food-related media “always'' or “often'' to help them relax before bed. I'm looking at “to''. The average person watches 13 of her food-related videos in a week.

The most notable food media personalities and chefs are Gordon Ramsay (30%), Guy Fieri (24%), Alton Brown (18%), Uncle Roger (15%), and Matti Matheson (14%) ) is.

“Of course, if you continue to use social media for too long, you'll start to feel burnout and stress,” Michaelides said. “But what kind of content do people interpret as beneficial to their mental health? , and it is interesting that it follows a dietary pattern that is a key component of stress relief.”

Top 10 tasks to reduce stress