Eating more orange-red fruits every day can make people 3 to 4 years younger!

Flavonoids are natural compounds found in plants and are considered powerful antioxidants

"There is increasing evidence that flavonoids are powerful when it comes to preventing your thinking ability from declining with age," said study author Walter Willett, a doctor of medicine at Harvard University in Boston, Massachusetts.

At the beginning of the study, the subjects were 49,493 women with an average age of 48 years and 27,842 men with an average age of 51 years

The group with the most flavonoids consumed an average of 600 mg of food per day, while the group with the least flavonoids consumed 150 mg of food per day

After adjusting for factors such as age and total calorie intake, people who consume more flavonoids in their diet have a lower risk of cognitive decline

Researchers also studied individual flavonoids

Willett said: "In our study, the long-term best performers ate on average at least half a serving of these foods a day, such as orange juice, oranges, peppers, celery, grapefruit, grapefruit juice, apples, and pears

One limitation of this study is that the participants reported their diet and may not be able to fully recall what they ate or how much they ate

This research was supported by the National Institutes of Health

Tian-Shin Yeh, Changzheng Yuan, Alberto Ascherio, Bernard Rosner, Walter Willett, Deborah Blacker.