Sports, mental activity and plant foods linked to better cognitive aging

In a 13-year study, people who maintained high cognitive function were more likely to report active lifestyles, better quality of life and higher plant-based food intake.

Editorial illustration — not from the study.

Researchers identified distinct long-term patterns of cognitive aging among 696 dementia-free older adults followed in the prospective TREND study. Participants completed comprehensive cognitive testing every two years for an average of 13 years, allowing the researchers to group them by their changes over time.

Compared with people who began with lower cognitive function and experienced progressive decline, those who maintained high cognitive function had faster gait speed and higher health-related quality of life. They also reported more frequent sports and cognitively stimulating activities, as well as greater intake of plant-based foods.

Different paths over time

The researchers clustered 696 dementia-free participants according to their changes on comprehensive cognitive tests taken every two years over an average of 13 years. They identified distinct cognitive-aging subgroups, including a best-performing group that maintained high cognitive function and a lowest-performing group with low baseline function and progressive decline.

Compared with the lowest-performing group, the best-performing group had significantly faster gait speed and higher health-related quality of life. Its members also reported doing sports and cognitively stimulating activities more often and eating more plant-based foods. The best-performing group had higher plant-based food intake than all the other groups, while the intermediate groups showed fewer differences. The researchers also examined personality, mental and neuropsychological health, diet, genetic markers and biofluid markers, but the abstract does not specify additional significant differences for these measures.

Why the paths matter

The findings show that cognitive aging is not uniform: people followed several distinct long-term paths rather than one common pattern. The links between more favorable cognitive trajectories and potentially modifiable characteristics—including physical activity, cognitively stimulating activities and plant-based food intake—provide a basis for future research and multidisciplinary approaches to healthy cognitive aging. The study does not establish that changing these characteristics will prevent cognitive decline.

Evidence and caveats

The study analyzed 696 dementia-free participants in the prospective TREND study, using cognitive tests conducted every two years for an average of 13 years. Researchers grouped participants according to their patterns of cognitive change and compared health, behavior, lifestyle, genetic and biofluid measures recorded at the start. Because the study was observational, the associations do not show that exercise, cognitive activities or plant-based foods caused better cognitive aging. The abstract also does not establish how broadly the findings apply beyond this study population.

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