While we often focus on the external benefits of a healthy diet, it’s crucial to remember that what we consume also impacts our internal functions, including our brain health.

According to health experts, certain foods can significantly harm our cognitive abilities and overall wellness, particularly our capacity to learn and memorise.

Felice Jacka, Alfred Deakin Professor of Nutritional Psychiatry, appeared on an episode of the ZOE health podcast alongside ZOE co-founder and CEO Dr Jonathan Wolf. The discussion centred around ultra-processed foods, which reportedly makeup approximately two-thirds of people’s calorie intake in the United States.

Felice defined ultra-processed food as “food deconstructed from its original ingredients and put back together again, and it usually has a list of other ingredients that are not found in whole foods.”

She added that these could include artificial sugars, food colourings, preservatives, emulsifiers, and more. These ultra-processed foods can be obvious items like ice cream and crisps, but also ready-made meals and some types of bread.

Felice further explained that a recent study involving young, healthy individuals was conducted where participants were given a chocolate milkshake and a cheese toastie for breakfast over four days, reports the Daily Record.

She elaborated: “In one group, their version of that was very high fat, high sugar, and the other version of that wasn’t, and they were randomly assigned to both.

“And what they saw was within four days, they could see an impact on this hippocampal related learning and memory tasks in these young people.”

She also pointed out that by enhancing your diet and reducing ultra-processed foods, brain health can be improved “as little as three weeks”.

Jonathan Wolf, the host, chimed in: “You can see that basically people with a bad diet and lots of ultra processed food that actually you can, you can see in real time the sort of hippocampus, shrinking.”

“And that’s linked to a lot of bad things as well, like dementia. And on the other hand, there is this possibility to improve your diet. It’s not too late. You can actually grow your hippocampus. So I love that. It’s a bit like going to the gym, but for your brain.”