A nutritional supplement found to reduce aggression by up to 28%

If you’re worried about being too aggressive from time to time, you may be able to regain your cool.

Research shows that there is one supplement that can significantly reduce aggression.

The solution that the evidence suggests is to add the following some omega 3 For your diet.

This fatty acid, available as a dietary supplement via fish oil capsules, is thought to benefit mental and physical health and may help reduce aggression, according to a 2024 study.

Watch the video below to learn more.

This research result did not come out of nowhere. Omega-3s have long been linked to protection against schizophrenia, while nutritional deficiencies are thought to be partly responsible for aggression and antisocial behavior.

Research shows that what we eat can affect brain chemistry.

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania built on an earlier small study on the effects of omega-3 supplements on aggression. Their meta-analysis included 29 randomized controlled trials with a total of 3,918 participants.

Across all trials, modest but significant short-term effects were found, with up to a 28 percent reduction in aggression across multiple different variables (including age, gender, medical diagnosis, and treatment duration and dose).

“I think it’s time to introduce omega-3 supplements to reduce aggression, whether it’s in the community, the clinic, or the criminal justice system,” neurocriminologist Adrian Raine said when the meta-analysis was published.

The trials included in this study were conducted from 1996 to 2024 and lasted an average of 16 weeks. It covered a variety of demographics, from children under 16 to people between 50 and 60 years old.

Additionally, the reduction in aggression included both reactive aggression (responses to provocation) and proactive aggression (pre-planned actions). Until this study, it wasn’t clear whether omega-3s could help with these different types of aggression.

Although larger studies over longer periods of time will be needed to further establish this relationship, this study increases our understanding of how fish oil pills and the omega-3s they contain may benefit the brain.

“At the very least, parents seeking treatment for aggressive children should know that an extra fish or two each week, in addition to any other treatment their child is receiving, may also be helpful,” Lane says.

Researchers suspect that something in the way omega-3s reduce inflammation and keep important processes active in the brain may help regulate aggression.

There are still many unanswered questions, but the researchers suggest there is enough evidence to investigate this further.

Add in research showing that fish oil-based medicines can help reduce the risk of fatal heart attacks, strokes, and other heart health problems, and it appears there are many benefits to adding omega-3s to your diet.

“Omega-3s are not a silver bullet that will completely solve the problem of violence in society,” Lane said.

“But will it help? Based on these findings, we strongly believe it will help, and we need to start acting on the new knowledge we have gained.”

For now, the most important thing will be further research to investigate this and see if omega-3s have any future in treating aggression in patients.

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Based on their findings, researchers are optimistic about that possibility.

“The results of this study show that omega-3 supplementation, even at moderate levels, significantly reduces aggressive behavior in the short term,” the researchers wrote in their paper.

“Given the enormous economic and psychological costs of aggression and violence in society, even small impacts need to be taken seriously.

“Regarding the clinical implications based on these findings, our considered opinion is that there is sufficient evidence to begin introducing omega-3 supplements to reduce aggression at moderate levels in children and adults.

“At a minimum, we argue that omega-3 supplementation should be considered as an adjunct to other interventions, whether psychological in nature (such as CBT) or pharmacological (such as risperidone), and that caregivers should be informed about the potential benefits of omega-3 supplementation.”

This study aggression and violent behavior.

A previous version of this article was published in June 2024.