Want an intelligent and brainy baby?
When you are pregnant, your developing baby in the womb obtains their nutrition from what mommy eats. So, it is definitely important to eat healthy foods.
However, did you know that you can boost the intelligence of your child by eating a Mediterranean diet?
More about the study
According to this new research based on 626 babies and their mums in Spain, a Mediterranean diet can help improve your child's cognitive and social-emotional wellbeing. The findings were published in the journal JAMA Network.
In the study, participants were divided into three groups. They were either assigned 'usual care', told to follow a Mediterranean diet, or to go to mindfulness-based stress reduction classes.
Foods included in the Mediterranean diet
Those on the Mediterranean diet were given extra virgin olive oil, walnuts, healthy fats, fruit, vegetables, whole grains, legumes, as well as a low amount of dairy and red meat.
Read more: Screen time might delay functional, communication development in toddlers, finds study
Impact of this diet on babies' brains
When babies were born and when they were two years old, researchers used a test that measures their cognitive, language, motor, adaptive, and social-emotional development.
The researchers found that mums who followed the Mediterranean diet had kids with “significantly higher scores” cognitive and social-emotional wellbeing, compared to those receiving usual care.
Impact of mindfulness classes during pregnancy
The researchers also found that those who were assigned to the mindfulness classes had babies who were more likely to have better social-emotional well-being, compared to infants of pregnant women who received the usual care.
Since the moms practicing mindfulness reported less anxiety and stress compared to the other study groups, this may have helped to reduce inflammatory proteins and hormones which may impact fetal brain development.
Word of caution
Dr Duane Mellor, registered dietitian and senior lecturer at Aston Medical School in Birmingham, said, “This is an interesting study which builds on a study previously done in a smaller group in Spain. The findings of this need to be treated with caution as over half of those women who enrolled onto the study did not complete the study, many because they declined to complete the study or moved away and cannot be contacted," The Sun quoted.
“It is unknown if the infants from these pregnancies would have demonstrated the same outcomes. It is also not known if the change in diet or mindfulness directly led to the changes observed or as the study was not blinded and participants knew what was happening, that they might have become more motivated and this led to other beneficial lifestyle changes which continued after childbirth and could explain the outcomes,” Dr Mellor added.