Eating a high-quality diet in youth and middle age could help keep your brain functioning well in your senior years, according to new preliminary findings from a study that used data collected from over 3,000 people followed for nearly seven decades. The research adds to a growing body of evidence that a healthy diet could help ward off Alzheimer's disease and age-related cognitive decline. Whereas most previous research on the topic has focused on eating habits of people in their 60s and 70s, the new study is the first to track diet and cognitive ability throughout the lifespan -; from age 4 to 70 -; and suggests the links may start much earlier than previously recognized.
These initial findings generally support current public health guidance that it is important to establish healthy dietary patterns early in life in order to support and maintain health throughout life. Our findings also provide new evidence suggesting that improvements to dietary patterns up to midlife may influence cognitive performance and help mitigate, or lessen, cognitive decline in later years." Kelly Cara, PhD, a recent graduate of the Gerald J.
and Dorothy R. Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University Cara will present the findings at NUTRITION 2024, the flagship annual meeting of the American Society for Nutrition held June 29–July 2 in Chicago. Cognitive performance, or thinking ability, can keep improving well into middle age, but typically begins to decline after age .
