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US older adults that consume avocado or guacamole have better cognition than non-consumers: National health and nutrition examination survey 2011–2014
This cross-sectional study by Cheng, Ford, & Taylor (2021) aimed to investigate the relationship between avocados and older individuals’ cognitive performance. Two thousand eight hundred eighty-six people who were 60 or older and satisfied the qualifying requirements for the 2011-2014 iteration of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) were recruited for this study. The participants were categorized as non-consumers or avocado consumers based on whether they reported consuming avocado or guacamole in their 24-hour dietary recalls. The Animal Fluency Test, the immediate and delayed recall (IWR/DWR) of the Consortium to Establish a Registry for Alzheimer’s Disease (CERAD), and the Digit Symbol Substitution Test were utilized to evaluate cognitive performance. As education level might affect cognitive function, the authors computed the education-dependent z-scores for each subject. For individuals who had finished all four tests, the global cognitive score—an average of the z-scores for each cognitive test—was determined. In the unadjusted model, the authors noted that avocado eaters had a considerably higher global cognition score and significantly superior results on all cognitive tests. When possible confounders were taken into account, some mean differences decreased, while others did not. Avocado users exhibited considerably higher global cognitive scores and CERAD IWR and DWR z-scores than non-consumers. The authors concluded that eating avocados was linked to considerably improved IWR, DWR, and global cognition scores and that this relationship held true even after adjusting for all pertinent variables. [NPID: Cognitive performance, older adults, avocado, brain health, NHANES]
Year: 2021
