Keeping the brain young and healthy is a group effort. It takes mental stimulation (sudoku and daily crossword puzzles, for example), good sleep hygiene, regular physical exercise, and emotional wellness. Diet also matters—you might have heard of "brain food," a superior group of berries, fatty fish, and green, leafy vegetables known to prevent cognitive decline. And now, scientists say walnuts can also keep your mind sharp.
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A new study classifies walnuts as brain food.
Walnuts are an excellent source of magnesium, potassium, iron, calcium, sodium, and vitamin B. According to the Nutritive Value of Foods, guidelines outlined by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), a quarter-cup of walnuts packs 18 grams of healthy fat, four grams of protein, and fiber.
The nut also belongs to an elite group called "brain food." A new study published in the journal Food & Function suggests that eating walnuts with breakfast can boost cognitive performance and brain activity throughout the day.
"This study helps strengthen the case for walnuts as brain food," lead researcher and University of Reading professor Claire Williams said in a statement obtained by PsyPost.
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Eating walnuts with breakfast may improve all-day memory and response time.
For the study, researchers prepared two calorie-matched breakfasts for 32 healthy young adults (ages 18-30), one of which contained 50 grams of walnuts. They tracked mood ratings, memory recall performance, and blood analysis at baseline and the two-, four-, and six-hour marks post-consumption. Participants also underwent an electroencephalogram (EEG), which tests electrical activity in the brain.
The results ruled in favor of the walnut breakfast diet. By hour six, this group recorded faster reaction times and performed better on cognitive function tasks than the control group. During these exercises, the EEG test picked up higher frequencies of frontoparietal activity among the walnut eaters.
Walnuts were also associated with improvements in glucose and fatty acid levels. The only caveat to the experiment was that the control group reported better mood ratings—however, researchers chalk that up to a possible "general dislike" of walnuts (i.e. their taste and/or texture).
"A handful of walnuts with breakfast could give young adults a mental edge when they need to perform at the top of their game. It’s particularly exciting that such a simple dietary addition could make a measurable difference to cognitive performance," said Williams of the discovery.
The takeaway:
Research indicates that adding walnuts to your breakfast can keep your mind sharp all day. As for the science behind it, walnuts are known to be high in omega-3 fatty acids, protein/peptides, and flavonoids, all of which can boost cognitive function, wrote the authors.
However, more research is needed to understand the long-term brain health benefits of walnuts.
