Food additives and Hyperactivity! Stephen Fry says there's no link!

[nellypope]

I am confused! I recently watched an episode of QI where they dispelled the rumour that there is a link between food additives and hyperactive children. But according to a recent study there is! Which is it do you think? Personally I would place more faith in the wise words of Mr Fry and his QI researchers :-)

[boxtops]

First hand evidence - my niece eats red food colouring (smarties in particular) and is then hyperactive for hours. I don't know - Stephen Fry often says he dispels myths but I don't always know whether to believe him on all of them.

[cazzz1975]

what is QI?

[cazzz1975]

stephen fry is not a doctor or a scientist.

[ummmm]

I think there is. Why was the blue smartie removed? Why did my son start bouncing off the walls after eating some chewits?

To me it was like him taking drugs. Stay calm and wait until the effects wear off....then add what he'd eaten to the list of banned food.

[cazzz1975]

my brother used to become hyperactive after eating anything with E numbers in.

[lcg]

we used to save all our yellow sweets for a boy in our class at school who quite willingly ate them and then weny apesh!t! he enjoyed the buzz and we enjoyed watching the mayhem....we were cruel buggers, really eh? x

[cazzz1975]

yes very, apart from bouncing off the walls, the e number high makes kids feel unwell and wired.

[ummmm]

My Ex use to give my son blue smarties before sending him home :-(

[nellypope]

well apparently, and these are Stephen's words, NOT MINE, according to scientists the hyperactivity displayed in children is a parent projection (or something like that) implying that because we expect them to "bounce off the walls" we perceive their behaviour as doing so.

[ummmm]

I don't think any parent that has had to deal with a hyper child because of E numbers would willingly give them anything that might effect them. So...why would we expect them to bounce off the walls when we avoid foods that do that to them.

It happened to my son mainly out of the house when someone else gave him sweets from the banned list. I'd know within minutes that he'd eaten something.

[mollykins]

QI is one of the best shows ever. One of my favourite moments was when Steven asked; 'How old are you?', the show had been on for about 5 series and so they knew the kind of tricks the show played on them, so noone answered for ages, then I think it was dara OBrien who answered (36 or whatever his age was) and the alarms went for the obvious, but wrong answers that the contestants so often give.

[cazzz1975]

the problem with these people that assume its all in the parents heads is the fact they have never dealt with the problem first hand themselves.

its convienient to assume its woolly parenting when you are a gay man with no children

[ummmm]

My son grew out of it as well. Nothing seems to effect him now.