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Eating all meals within an eight-to-nine-hour window each day may offer benefits for brain health beyond weight loss alone, according to new research presented at a major nutrition conference
The research was presented at NUTRITION 2026, the annual meeting of the American Society for Nutrition in National Harbor, Maryland
Researchers found that participants who restricted their daily eating window showed improvements in certain cognitive abilities after six months, even though they lost a similar amount of weight as those who followed a more typical eating schedule
…
“We are confident it is due to meal timing itself, because this was a randomized controlled trial and both groups lost weight (about 8 percent) but there was a greater cognitive benefit only in the group that also was restricting their eating window to 8 hours compared to the control group eating 12 hours,” Sue Shapses, a professor at Rutgers University and Rutgers-RWJ Medical Center and the study’s principal investigator, told Newsweek
However, she cautioned that the findings were limited to women with overweight or obesity who were actively losing weight
“We did not study leaner women or those who are not losing weight during the time-restricted eating,” Shapses said. “As a result, we cannot confidently state that it applies to other women, or to men.”
Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia are becoming increasingly common as populations age
Previous research has linked diet and lifestyle habits to dementia risk, but relatively few studies have explored whether changing those habits can help reduce that risk
To investigate, researchers enrolled 47 women between the ages of 50 and 79 who were overweight or obese
All participants were advised to cut 500 calories from their daily diets as part of a weight-loss program
Twenty-six women were assigned to a time-restricted eating plan, limiting food consumption to fewer than nine hours per day
Most ate between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m., resulting in an average eating window of 8.2 hours
The remaining participants maintained a more conventional schedule, eating over roughly 12 hours per day on average
After six months, women in both groups had lost about 15 pounds on average, suggesting that the amount of weight lost was not the key factor separating the groups
Instead, differences emerged in cognitive performance
Compared with women who maintained a 12-hour eating window, those who restricted eating to eight or nine hours a day performed significantly better on tests measuring spatial planning and problem-solving abilities
Researchers also observed a trend toward fewer mistakes on memory and learning tasks, although those improvements did not reach statistical significance
The findings suggest participants may have become better at remembering information during everyday activities while making fewer mistakes linked to memory, attention and problem-solving
The researchers also found that greater reductions in the eating window were associated with larger cognitive improvements
Shapses said the approach may also be practical for people who cannot follow a strict schedule every day
“If they can’t do this every day—due to weekend events or weekday business dinners—it is OK to have occasional aberrations,” she said, noting that participants in the study also occasionally de
The team cautioned that the study was small and that the findings remain preliminary
“At this point, we will continue our analysis and submit the full length manuscript for peer-review for publication,” Shapses said
Reference
American Society for Nutrition. “Eating within 8 hours may help keep the aging brain sharp.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 27 July 2026. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2026/07/260727012125.htm
Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Kara Dolman and Emma Lee-Sang
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