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Getting depressed can drive a person to chocolate, research suggests.
A US study of 931 men and women found a strong association between chocolate consumption and mood.
Participants with signs of depression ate 8.4 servings of chocolate per month on average, while non-depressed individuals restricted themselves to 5.4 servings.
People with high depression assessment scores guzzled even more chocolate - as many as 11.8 servings. A medium serving was defined as one ounce of chocolate, slightly less than a normal-sized bar.
Scientists believe chocolate may have properties that improve mood, as has been demonstrated in rat studies.
Eating chocolate when depressed may therefore be a form of "self-treatment".
Alternatively, it is just possible the association is the other way round, and eating too much chocolate causes depression.
Research leader Dr Beatrice Golomb, from the University of California at San Diego, said: "Our study confirms long-held suspicions that eating chocolate is something that people do when they are feeling down. Because it was a cross sectional study, meaning a slice in time, it did not tell us whether the chocolate decreased or intensified the depression."
None of the volunteers taking part in the study were taking antidepressants. A standard psychological questionnaire was used to screen them for depressive symptoms.
They were also asked to submit details about their overall diet and how much chocolate they ate a week. No differentiation was made between milk and dark chocolate.
