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Effects of lunch on children's short-term cognitive functioning: a randomized crossover study

K Müller1, L Libuda, N Gawehn

  • 1Application-oriented Research, Research Institute of Child Nutrition (FKE), Dortmund, Germany. mueller@fke-do.de

European Journal of Clinical Nutrition
|February 7, 2013
PubMed

Insights

Skipping lunch did not significantly impact children's cognitive functions like memory or attention in the early afternoon. This study provides initial insights into the effects of meal timing on cognitive performance in school-aged children.

Area of Science:

  • Pediatric Nutrition
  • Cognitive Neuroscience
  • Public Health

Background:

  • All-day schooling is common globally, making understanding lunch's impact on children's cognition crucial.
  • Previous research on meal timing and cognition primarily involved adults.
  • This study addresses the gap in knowledge regarding lunch's effect on children's cognitive performance.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate the impact of skipping lunch versus having lunch on children's cognitive functioning.
  • To assess cognitive performance in the early afternoon following different lunch conditions.
  • To provide public health-relevant data on meal timing and children's cognition.

Main Methods:

  • A randomized crossover study involving 105 healthy 6th-grade students.
  • Participants either skipped lunch or had lunch on separate study days.
  • Cognitive functions including tonic alertness, visuospatial memory, and selective attention were assessed using the Vienna Test System.

Main Results:

  • No significant differences in cognitive functioning were observed between the lunch and no-lunch conditions.
  • While omission errors were higher when skipping lunch, this did not remain significant after adjusting for multiple testing.
  • Tonic alertness was the only cognitive measure showing no difference between the two conditions.

Conclusions:

  • Lunch consumption did not demonstrate relevant effects on children's cognitive functioning in the early afternoon.
  • This is the first study to examine the effects of lunch on cognitive performance in children.
  • Further research is needed to explore potential methodological and physiological explanations for these findings.
Abstract

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