So, is it true? Does chocolate make you smarter?

This is the best news we've heard in a while.

Over the years we have found more and more excuses to eat chocolate - not that we ever needed one. And now, a (very welcomed) study suggests that eating chocolate makes you smarter. The research was based on lifestyle information, originally collected by the Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Study (MSLS) which has been monitoring the health of nearly 2000 individuals since 1976. They compared the scores of cognitive tests taken by those who ate chocolate less than once a week and those who ate it more than once a week. The result was delightfully surprising.  There were significant positive associations between high frequency chocolate in-take and a positive performance in cognitive tests.

''Habitual chocolate intake was related to cognitive performance, measured with an extensive battery of neuropsychological tests. More frequent chocolate consumption was significantly associated with better performance on the Global Composite score, Visual-Spatial Memory and Organization, Working Memory, Scanning and Tracking, Abstract Reasoning, and the Mini-Mental State Examination.'' The study said.

So next time you feel guilty about eating a whole bar of chocolate to yourself (which you should never feel guilty about anyway) remember it actually makes you smarter.