The brain skills of junk food chaos

According to groundbreaking research from the University of Sydney, the fries and donuts you crave may undermine your ability to find your way out. In a first human study published in the International Journal of Obesity, scientists found that fat and sugar impair high spatial navigation diets are the brain’s ability to remember location and routes.

Using a virtual reality maze, participants navigated to find a hidden treasure and found that young people who regularly consumed foods of saturated fat and refined sugar performed much worse in their position in their chest than in those who were eating healthy.

“The good news is that we think it’s an easy and reversible situation,” said Dominic Tran, PhD, from the School of Psychology, the School of Science, which led the study. “Diet changes can improve the health of the hippocampus, so we have the ability to explore new cities or learn new routes when we go home.”

Most surprisingly, these cognitive effects remain significant even when the body mass index and working memory were controlled, suggesting that diet affects brain function independently of weight or general cognitive abilities. The results suggest that the hippocampus (a brain region that is critical for spatial memory and navigation) may be particularly susceptible to unhealthy dietary patterns.

The study is based on a large number of animal studies and shows that rats fed a high-fat, high-sugar diet often experience spatial memory deficits soon before any significant weight gain occurs. The new study provides compelling evidence that both humans and younger ages are similar than previously recognized.

During the experiment, 55 college students browsed a treasure chest in a virtual maze surrounded by landmarks six times. In the seventh trial, participants had to identify the previous position of the chest based on memory alone. Those who consume less fat and sugary foods always point out the location more accurately.

“We have long known that eating too much refined sugar and saturated fat can bring risks of obesity, metabolic and cardiovascular disease, and certain cancers,” explains Dr. Tran. “This study gives us evidence that diet is important for brain health in early adulthood, a period when cognitive function is usually intact.”

These findings are amid increasing concerns about Western dietary patterns and their long-term effects on brain health. Although previous studies have linked poor diets to decreased cognitive abilities in middle-aged and older people, this study suggests that even young people may have immediate cognitive effects from dietary choices.

For navigation challenges that rely heavily on GPS technology, these implications are obvious, and the extra help of fries may make your in-house GP less reliable. Good news? Unlike age-related cognitive decline, diet-induced spatial deficits appear to be reversible through healthier eating habits.

As researchers continue to investigate the link between diet and brain function, the study provides compelling evidence that the food we choose not only affects our waistline, but also the ability to keep our surroundings and remember the world around us.