10 Food Myths Put to the Test

1. Eating Chocolate Gives You Pimples

Not so, says Dr Pam Brown, fellow of the Australasian College of Dermatologists. "There is no good data that support that theory, although it used to be in a lot of dermatology textbooks. It's a myth that has a long history; it was originally touted in the early 1930s. There were a couple of studies in the 1960s and '70s, but these studies were poorly designed and not well done.

We do know that food is possibly one of a great number of factors, including genetics and the structure of the diet, that lead to acne." There is, she says, some evidence that high glycemic load may affect the body's production of the hormone androgen, "and androgen is one of the things that, in a genetically susceptible person, drives the development of acne lesions. But chocolate itself hasn't been implicated."