Correlation between breakfast tryptophan content and morningness - eveningness in Japanese infants and students aged 0-15 yrs

Abstract

Tryptophan can be metabolized via 5-hydroxytryptamine=serotonin to melatonin by a series of 4 enzymes in pineal body. Lack of serotonin in body fluid in the brain during daytime can lead to several psychiatric disorders, while shortage of plasma-melatonin at night can be related to sleep disorders. The Morningness-Eveningness (M-E) questionnaire and the original questionnaire including questions on sleep habits, mental symptoms, and contents of meals were administered to 1055 infants aged 0-6 yrs, 751 students attending an elementary school, and 473 students attending junior high school in Kochi City (33°N). The index of tryptophan taken at breakfast (Trp-Index) was calculated as tryptophan amount per one meal based on the tryptophan included in each 100 g of the foods and a standard amount of food per one meal. A significant positive-correlation between M-E scores and Trp-Index was not shown by relatively older students, aged 9-15yrs (Pearson's test, r= 0.044-0.123, p=0.071-0.505), whereas a significant positive correlation was shown by infants and young elementary school students aged 0-8yrs (r=0.180, 0.258, p<0.001). The more frequently the infants had difficulty falling asleep at bedtime and waking up in the morning, the less the Trp-Indices taken at breakfast were (Kruskall-Wallis-test, p=0.027 for difficulty falling asleep; p=0.00S for difficulty waking up). The more frequently infants became angry even by a little trigger, or depressed, the lower (more evening-typed) the M-E scores were (Kruskal-Wallis test: p≤0.001). Tryptophan ingested at breakfast is very important for children to keep a morning-type diurnal rhythm, high quality of sleep, and indirectly good mental health, presumably, through the metabolism of tryptophan to serotonin in daytime and further to melatonin at night.