'Healthy diet 'boosts childhood IQ'

Morag

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-12381041

8 February 2011 Last updated at 07:52 GMT

Eating chips, chocolate and cake may be damaging to a child's intelligence, according to researchers at Bristol University.

Their study suggests a link between a diet high in processed foods and a slightly lower IQ.

Writing in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, they suggest poor nutrition may affect brain development.

The British Dietetic Association said more young parents needed to be educated about healthy eating.

The eating habits of 3,966 children taking part in the The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children were recorded at the ages of three, four, seven and eight and a half.

The researchers said three types of diet emerged: Processed diets which were high in fat, sugar and convenience foods, traditional diets of meat, potato and vegetables, and health conscious diets of salads, fruit and fish.

The children all took IQ tests when they were eight and half.
Brain development

The researchers found a link between IQ and diet, even after taking into account other factors such as the mother's level of education, social class and duration of breast feeding.

A diet high in processed food at the age of three was linked to a slightly lower IQ at the age of eight and a half, suggesting early eating habits have a long term impact.

Dr Pauline Emmett, who carried out the study at Bristol University, said: "Brain development is much faster in early life, it's when it does most of its growing. It seems that what happens afterwards is less important."

Although the relationship between diet and IQ was very strong, the impact was quite small. Processed foods were linked with IQs only a few points lower.

Experts in the field said the results had confirmed common sense.

Fiona Ford, spokesperson for the British Dietetic Association, said: "It's well worth looking at the long term impact of diets, everyone's familiar with the short term.

"The research confirms the type of advice we already know, but that's not always enough. Sometimes a society has to help a person change, we need to be educating more young parents about healthy eating."

Kristian Bravin, dietician at Leicester Royal Infirmary, said: "Most people know what they should do, some people don't have the inclination to cook good meals.

"I'm all in favour of a little bit of what you fancy, but when you're doing it every week it's a problem.

"People should seek advice from a registered dietician, but simply it's a message of moderating fat intake, five fruit and veg a day and whole grain starchy foods."

It can be hard not to go for the convenience option with there only being so many hours in the day, but every home should have a fruit bowl imo.

Dades

Fruit = Nature's Candy!

Dave!

Here's a blog post analysing it a bit more
http://theness.com/neurologicablog/?p=2806

An important point:

But I must point out that this is an epidemiological, not experimental, study. So the children were not randomized to different diets. The researchers controlled for the obvious confounding factors, like socio-economic group and breast feeding, but there are potentially many other confounding factors that were not controlled for. For example – parents who rely on processed food might do so because they have little time to cook or prepare better meals. These same parent may spend less quality time with their children. Or parents who allow their kids to eat mainly processed foods may be more permissive in general. I wonder, for example, if they controlled for television watching or video-game playing.

The results of the study might just be pointing to other factors that influence IQ.

gbee

Naturally, quantities are the problem. Crisps need not be all bad, a bag the odd time at time of high activity might even be good, munching crisps watching TV etc is bad.

I kept my own children on a strict diet until they were about 10. My youngest at his last dental exam in school was very impressed as he was the only one in school who had no fillings.

He turned out to be quite smart too.

cynder

gbee wrote: »

I kept my own children on a strict diet until they were about 10. My youngest at his last dental exam in school was very impressed as he was the only one in school who had no fillings.

He turned out to be quite smart too.

That says a lot for me so, i breast fed my lady till she was 2 and a half and at 3 she had 8 teeth removed for chronic tooth decay and again had 2 teeth removed at 6. No strict diet, she was diagnosed a diabetic at 7 adn has at least 1 sugar rush a day some days she could have 3 or 4 sugar rush's.

Her Last STens were 7 being high average for both English and math and in her parent teacher meeting we were told that she has it in her to do better. No idea what her IQ is, she is doing well and thats all that matters.

planetX

Wouldn't parents with higher IQs be more likely to understand what constitutes a healthy diet? It's a bit of a circular effect - you can use statistics to suggest anything.