Healthier Diets, Lower Waist-to-Hip Ratio in Midlife Improve Later Cognitive Health

TUESDAY, March 18, 2025 (HealthDay News) — Healthier diets and lower waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) throughout midlife are associated with better brain and cognitive health in older age, according to a study published online March 12 in JAMA Network Open.

Daria E.A. Jensen, D.Phil., from University of Oxford in the United Kingdom, and colleagues used data from participants in the Whitehall II Study to understand how longitudinal changes in diet quality (512 participants) and WHR (664 participants) during midlife are associated with hippocampal connectivity and cognitive function in later life.

The researchers found that better diet quality in midlife and from midlife to late life was associated with higher hippocampal functional connectivity to the occipital lobe and cerebellum and better white matter integrity as measured by higher fractional anisotropy and lower diffusivity. Furthermore, higher WHR in midlife was associated with higher mean diffusivity and radial diffusivity (covering 26.4 and 23.1 percent, respectively, of the total white matter tracts in the cingulum and superior and inferior longitudinal fasciculus) and lower fractional anisotropy in the corticospinal tract (covering 4.9 percent of the white matter skeleton), including the inferior longitudinal fasciculus and cingulum. Diffusivity partially mediated associations between midlife WHR, working memory, and executive function.

“The findings suggest that interventions to improve diet and manage central obesity might be most effective between ages 48 and 70 years,” the authors write.

Abstract/Full Text

Editorial