Tea consumption and mental health in ageing: Findings from ethnic Chinese populations

Abstract

The association between tea and better physical health is supported by accumulating evidence from decades of research that have examined the role of tea in reducing the risk of various medical conditions. Although it is generally believed that tea ingestion improves psychological performance and mental well-being, the mental health benefits of long-term tea drinking were only examined by a handful of research studies in recent years. Using large data from community-based cohort studies in ethnic Chinese populations in Singapore and China, my coworkers and I have systematically examined the role of tea drinking on mental health in aging in recent years.1-6 We are particularly interested incognition and depression in the elderly