Your child eats some rainbow-colored candy and there's a good chance he or she will soon be bouncing off the walls.
Is the sugar to blame? Or the stuff that gives the candy its bright color?

"Michael would get easily frustrated. He would cry. He would get horrible headaches. He would throw up," said mother Beth Tribble.

Like a lot of kids his age, Michael Tribble enjoyed candy, orange crackers, sweet yogurt and pudding. But his mother noticed that after he ate these brightly colored foods, his behavior would change.

"I think a lot of the behavioral issues that parents are seeing is a direct result of the additives," she said.

Specifically she's talking about artificial food dye, used in thousands of foods. Things like yellow 6, used to make waffles a golden yellow and blue 1 and red 40 are used to give yogurts their blue and pink hues.

"It's not that the food dyes are the underlying cause of ADHD or hyperactivity but if a kid is predisposed to it, then the dyes can trigger outbursts and behavioral outbursts," said Michael Jacobson, co-founder and executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

He says research dating back to 1980 has linked food dyes with behavioral problems in children.

"Some children, certainly not all children, react sharply. They lose control over their impulses. Physically, they jump around, they might yell, scream out," Jacobson said.

A 2007 study by the UK's food standards agency, the British equivalent of the food and drug administration, found that eight and 9-year-olds who drank beverages with food dyes were more likely to become hyperactive.

Those findings prompted the agency to ask food manufacturers to get rid of six artificial colors in British foods by the end of 2009.

Jacobson says most companies have complied, but they haven't made changes to their U.S. products.

For example, strawberry Nutrigrain bars purchased in the U.S. are made with red 40. But the same strawberry snack in the UK uses paprika extract for color.

"The foods would automatically be safer for kids and that really should be the bottom line," Jacobson said.

The FDA maintains that there isn't enough data to conclusively link these dyes with hyperactivity in children. A statement on the agency's web site says they reviewed the British study and found it does "not substantiate a link between color additives that were tested and behavioral effects."

But for the Tribble family, they say getting the dyes out of their foods has made a big difference.

"He's more focused, he has more confidence. His handwriting is significantly improved. He can stay on task a whole lot better, but i think the biggest improvement is that he feels a whole better about himself," said Beth Tribble.

There is still a lot of controversy over this issue and the FDA maintains these dyes are safe. But some experts still feel that kids who might be predisposed to behavioral problems could be more sensitive to artificial food dyes.