[vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][mk_image src=”https://www.moveitorloseit.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/8-cocoa-Reuters.jpg” image_width=”800″ image_height=”350″ crop=”false” lightbox=”false” frame_style=”simple” target=”_self” caption_location=”inside-image” align=”left” margin_bottom=”10″][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][mk_padding_divider size=”40″][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_column_text disable_pattern=”true” align=”left” margin_bottom=”0″]What the research found

Scientists believe cocoa has the power to slow and, possibly, even reverse age-related memory loss. According to the study, by the Columbia University Medical Centre in New York, the antioxidants in cocoa, known as flavanols, can give people in their sixties the memory of a “typical 30 or 40-year-old”.

The trials involved 37 volunteers, aged between 50 and 69. After just three months, those who drank the high intake of flavanols showed signs of faster and clearer recognition of visual patterns. Brain scans before and after the trial showed more blood within the dentate gyrus part of the hippocampus, one of the few regions known to generate fresh brain cells.
“If a participant had the memory of a typical 60-year-old at the beginning of the study, after three months that person on average had the memory of a typical 30- or 40-year-old,” said the senior author, Dr Scott A  Small.

Good news?

This is thought to be the first evidence that age-related memory decline – a common problem that can cause older people to forget small things like the names of acquaintances or where they have placed their keys – can be countered through dietary changes.

The study, published in the online periodical Nature Neuroscience, follows research indicating cardiovascular benefits from cocoa. However, before you rush to the supermarket, experts said the study did not mean people should eat more chocolate, as the product used in the experiment was a specially made drink formulated from cocoa beans.

So what does this mean?

It’s still early days and the trial, although promising, is not conclusive. Dr Simon Ridley, of Alzheimer’s Research UK, said:  “This very small trial highlights some possible effects of flavanols found in cocoa beans over a short time period, but we’d need to see much longer, large-scale studies to fully understand whether a diet high in these flavanols could boost cognition in old age.”

Dr Liz Coulthard, a senior lecturer in dementia neurology at the University of Bristol, said:  “Only reaction times, and not accuracy of performance, were actually improved and being faster without being more accurate is not always an advantage.”[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][mk_padding_divider size=”40″][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_tweetme type=”horizontal”][/vc_column][/vc_row]