“Why a Cheat Meal Can Lead to Weight Gain and Affect Brain Health, According to Science”

We all know that healthy eating is important for our brains. But you can treat yourself to chips, chocolate or cookies at the weekend, right? According to science, absolutely not.

Researchers of the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Australia state that a cheat meal can lead to weight gain. A bag of chips every now and then can even affect brain function and gut health. The scientists came to this conclusion after studying the behavior of rats and rodents.

Research with rats

The team conducted experiments with twelve healthy rats fed standard rat chow. In addition, there were three groups of twelve rats that sometimes also received processed food with a lot of sugar. So basically a kind of chocolate or chips for rats.

The researchers measured the short-term memory and bacteria in the faeces of the rats before and after the process.

They also weighed the rats and tracked how much of each food type they consumed. That way they knew exactly how many cheat meals each rat had eaten. At the end of the study, both groups were compared.

Can’t we eat chips?

The results showed that rats that occasionally ate a cheat meal had fewer bacteria in their intestines. They had more bacteria associated with obesity and fewer good weight-balancing bacteria. They also suffered from cognitive impairment. For example, the rats were less able to process information or remember things after they had eaten their rats chips.

These results add to the growing evidence that your diet affects brain health. Changes in the gut in response to our diet can affect our brain and behavior. And certainly not in a positive sense. It seems that long-term healthy eating benefits both the gut and the brain. So leave that bag of chips for a while.

Anyone who is always pissed off at mosquitoes should try a different soap