Physical activity improves work ability

A lifelong influence from childhood to the end of career

Peer-Reviewed Publication

University of Jyväskylä - Jyväskylän yliopisto

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From an economic perspective, prioritizing physical activity among young people is essential.

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Credit: University of Jyväskylä

A study conducted at the University of Jyväskylä shows that regular leisure-time physical activity started at a young age prevents a decrease in work ability at the end of career. The result is societally significant, as productivity losses due to reduced work ability costs billions of euros annually.

The study utilised valuable longitudinal data from the LISE study, which has followed the same participants for 45 years. Participants’ leisure-time physical activity was measured at school age (ages 10–19), mid-adulthood (ages 35–44) and late adulthood (ages 55–64). Based on these measurements, researchers defined a lifetime leisure-time physical activity level and examined its association with work ability in late adulthood. 

The link between an active lifestyle and work ability persists throughout life

Higher levels of leisure-time physical activity throughout the life course were clearly linked to better work ability. All three activity measurements, spread across the lifespan, contributed significantly to both lifetime activity level and work ability. In addition, adherence to physical activity recommendations in late adulthood showed a dose-response association with improved work ability.

By utilising repeated measurements, the study demonstrates that regular leisure-time physical activity promotes work ability later in life. Previously, this link could not be conclusively verified.

“In previous studies, physical activity and work ability have been measured at the same point in time, or nearly so, which creates a risk of reverse causality,” says postdoctoral researcher Perttu Laakso from the Faculty of Sport and Health Sciences at the University of Jyväskylä. “This is because health problems that reduce work ability can also lead to a decrease in physical activity.” 

Investing in young people’s physical activity is economically profitable

The research underlines the importance of physical activity in childhood and adolescence, as previous studies show that individuals tend to maintain physical activity habits adopted at a young age into adulthood.

“From an economic perspective, prioritising physical activity among young people is essential,” says Laakso. “This is an investment in a healthy and productive future workforce.”

Laakso would allocate resources to developing and strengthening school physical education, as it reaches entire age cohorts. Furthermore, making youth sports accessible to children from all economic backgrounds would be a wise investment. 

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Journal

British Journal of Sports Medicine

DOI

10.1136/bjsports-2025-110339 

Morning exercise linked with lower cardiometabolic risk

 People who regularly exercised early in the morning were significantly less likely to have coronary artery disease, high blood pressure, Type 2 diabetes or obesity compared with people who exercised later in the day, according to a study being presented at the American College of Cardiology’s Annual Scientific Session (ACC.26).

The research is based on health records and Fitbit-derived heart rate data from over 14,000 people. Although it is unclear whether the relationship between exercise timing and cardiometabolic health is causal or mediated by other factors, researchers said the findings could inform approaches for counseling patients on physical activity based on a more granular look at exercise behaviors than has been possible before.

“Any exercise is going to be better than no exercise, but we tried to identify an additional dimension relating to the timing of exercise,” said Prem Patel, a medical student at the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School and the study’s lead author. “If you can exercise in the morning, it seems to be linked with better rates of cardiometabolic disease.”

Cardiometabolic disease markers such as high blood pressure, diabetes and obesity are associated with an increased risk of heart disease, the leading cause of death worldwide. Getting regular physical activity is known to reduce a person’s risk of these markers as well as serious cardiac events.

Researchers analyzed data from 14,489 individuals participating in All of Us, a large national study. Minute-level heart rate data from Fitbit devices were analyzed over the course of a year. To track bursts of physical activity, the researchers identified periods when participants had an elevated heart rate for 15 consecutive minutes or more. The methodology differs from other studies since it is based on the body’s response to exercise—elevated heart rate—rather than tracking particular activities such as walking to work, doing household chores or working out at the gym. 

Researchers assessed each participant’s exercise in 15-minute intervals throughout the day and grouped participants into categories based on their timing of exercise. Based on health records, researchers analyzed associations between exercise timing and high blood pressure, diabetes, obesity and hyperlipidemia (elevated LDL-C cholesterol or triglycerides). They also assessed rates of cardiovascular outcomes such as coronary artery disease and atrial fibrillation and accounted for other risk factors relevant to cardiovascular health such as age, sex, income level, total activity level, sleep duration, alcohol use and smoking status.

Compared to those who exercised later in the day, those who frequently exercised in the morning were 31% less likely to have coronary artery disease, 18% less likely to have high blood pressure, 21% less likely to have hyperlipidemia, 30% less likely to have Type 2 diabetes, and 35% less likely to have obesity. These associations were independent of the total daily amount of physical activity. Exercise between 7:00 and 8:00 a.m. was associated with the lowest odds of coronary artery disease.

Researchers said that the study offers a more holistic view of exercise than previous research and suggest that exercise timing may represent a previously underappreciated aspect of cardiometabolic health. Most studies have historically assessed total physical activity levels or tracked exercise timing for short periods; this is the first large study to assess exercise amount and timing based on long-term data from wearable devices.

“In the past, researchers have mainly looked at how much physical activity to do, the number of minutes or the intensity of physical activity,” Patel said. “Now with 1 in 3 Americans having a wearable device, we’re gaining the ability to look at exercise at the minute-by-minute level, and that opens a lot of doors in terms of new analyses.”

The findings show an association only and do not indicate whether early exercise habits cause improvements in health markers, researchers said. Patel said that biological factors such as hormones, sleep or genetics may play a role in the associations they observed. Behavioral and psychological factors also could be involved; for example, exercising early in the day could lead to higher energy levels and healthier food choices throughout the day, or it could be more common among people who prioritize healthy habits in general. Further research could help to determine the role of such factors and help inform exercise recommendations, the authors said.

For more information on the benefits of exercise on cardiovascular health, visit www.CardioSmart.org/MoveMore.

Moderate wine drinkers had a 21% lower risk of dying from cardiovascular disease

 

The health impacts of alcohol depend on what you drink – and how much

Low to moderate wine consumption shows lower risk compared with spirits, beer and cider

Reports and Proceedings

American College of Cardiology

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While high alcohol intake has been associated with worse health outcomes regardless of the type of alcohol consumed, the potential impacts of low to moderate alcohol intake appear to vary by beverage type, according to a study being presented at the American College of Cardiology’s Annual Scientific Session (ACC.26).

The study of more than 340,000 British adults adds to previous research showing less alcohol consumption is better for health and provides new insights into the impacts of drinking at low and moderate levels.

“These results come from the general population, and in certain high-risk groups, such as people with chronic diseases or cardiovascular conditions, the risks could be even higher,” said Zhangling Chen, MD, PhD, a professor at the Second Xiangya Hospital, Central South University in China and the study’s senior author.

Researchers analyzed alcohol consumption habits and mortality outcomes among 340,924 adults who participated in the UK Biobank study between 2006-2022. Each participant completed a dietary questionnaire when they enrolled in the study and were grouped into four categories based on their alcohol intake, measured in terms of grams of pure alcohol per day and week. For reference, a 12-ounce can of beer, a 5-ounce glass of wine and a 1.5-ounce shot of spirits each contain about 14 grams of pure alcohol. People consuming less than 20 g (about 1.5 standard drinks) per week were classified as never or occasional drinkers. Men consuming between 20 g per week and 20 g per day and women consuming between 20 g per week and 10 g per day were considered to have low alcohol consumption. Daily consumption of 20 g to 40 g (about 1.5 to three standard drinks) for men and 10 g to 20 g for women was considered moderate. Daily consumption of more than 40 g (about three drinks) for men and 20 g (about 1.5 drinks) for women was considered high. Health outcomes were tracked for over 13 years on average.

Compared with never or occasional drinkers, those with high alcohol consumption were 24% more likely to die from any cause, 36% more likely to die from cancer and 14% more likely to die from heart disease. Differences in risk by alcohol type emerged at low and moderate levels of consumption, where drinking spirits, beer or cider was associated with a significantly higher risk of death while the same level of wine consumption was associated with a significantly lower risk of death.

Looking at deaths from cardiovascular disease in particular, researchers found that moderate wine drinkers had a 21% lower risk of dying from cardiovascular disease compared with never or occasional drinkers. By contrast, even low intake of spirits, beer or cider was associated with a 9% higher risk of dying from cardiovascular disease compared with drinking never or occasionally.

“Our findings help clarify previously mixed evidence on low to moderate alcohol consumption,” Chen said. “These findings can help refine guidance, emphasizing that the health risks of alcohol depend not only on the amount of alcohol consumed, but also on the type of beverage. Even low to moderate intake of spirits, beer or cider is linked to higher mortality, while low to moderate intake of wine may carry lower risk.”

Researchers said that several factors may account for the differences by alcohol type. Certain compounds present in red wine, such as polyphenols and antioxidants, may have benefits for cardiovascular health. Wine is also more likely to be consumed with meals and by people who have higher-quality diets and healthier behaviors in general, while spirits, beer and cider are more likely to be consumed outside of meals and were associated with lower overall diet quality and other lifestyle risk factors.

“Taken together, these factors suggest that the type of alcohol, how it is consumed and the associated lifestyle behaviors all contribute to the observed differences in mortality risk,” Chen said.

In their analyses, researchers adjusted the data to account for demographic factors, socioeconomic status, lifestyle factors, cardiometabolic factors and family history of diabetes, cardiovascular disease and cancer. However, they said that the research has inherent limitations as an observational study and suggested that high-quality randomized trials could help to better understand the impacts of alcohol consumption. Alcohol consumption was assessed based on self-reporting at baseline and did not capture changes in drinking patterns over time. In addition, UK Biobank participants are generally healthier than the overall population, which may limit the study’s generalizability.

Despite these limitations, the study’s large sample size and length of follow-up strengthen its statistical power. Researchers said the study provides a more comprehensive and nuanced picture of the health impacts of alcohol consumption than many prior studies, offering a high degree of granularity in terms of the amount and type of alcohol consumed as well as a variety of mortality outcomes.  

Women who consume lower amounts of ultra-processed foods have higher odds of conceiving

Women who consume lower amounts of ultra-processed foods have higher odds of conceiving, according to new research from McMaster University. The link persists even after accounting for age, weight, lifestyle and other health factors.

 

The study analyzed data from over 2,500 women who participated in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) – a U.S. survey that combines interviews, 24-hour dietary recalls and laboratory tests to capture detailed information on diet, demographics, health status and biomarkers.

 

Researchers found distinct differences in eating patterns of women who reported infertility, defined as a lack of conception after one year of trying, and those who did not.

 

Women reporting infertility consumed more ultra-processed foods, making up about 31 per cent of their daily intake, and scored lower on adherence to the Mediterranean diet, a healthy eating pattern rich in fruits and vegetables, whole grains and healthy fats.

 

The findings suggest that what we eat – and the degree to which it is processed – may influence reproductive health in a manner well beyond calories or weight.

 

“Most of what we hear about ultra-processed foods focuses on calories and obesity. But our findings suggest something potentially more complex – there seems to be another mechanism at play which may reflect pathways beyond calories or weight, including chemical exposures that have been hypothesized in prior literature,” explains Anthea Christoforou, assistant professor in the Department of Kinesiology and senior author of the paper.

 

Even if nutrient intake looks fine, eating more ultra-processed foods means more exposure to additives and chemicals that go beyond calories, she adds. 

 

“Ultra-processed foods often carry chemicals like phthalates, BPA and acrylamides, which can leach from packaging or even from the plastic machinery used during processing. These compounds are known to disrupt hormones, and that may be part of why we’re seeing a link,” says Angelina Baric, a co-author and graduate student in the Department of Kinesiology.   

 

The Mediterranean diet showed a positive association with fertility, but this benefit disappeared once obesity was factored in, suggesting its effect may come from helping maintain a healthy weight and metabolism.

 

The findings, published today in Nutrition and Health, underscore the need for dietary guidance targeting women of reproductive age. While the effect may look modest on an individual level, in fully adjusted models higher ultra-processed food intake was associated with a roughly 60 per cent lower odds of fertility. Because this was a cross-sectional study, the findings reflect associations rather than cause and effect. Still, associations of this size could have meaningful implications at a population level, given how commonly ultra-processed foods are consumed.

 

“Very few studies have asked a fundamentally female-specific question: how does what women eat influence their reproductive health? Fertility is a huge outcome, and this is the first time anyone has examined these dietary patterns and infertility at this scale,” says Christoforou.

 

“It suggests diet may be an important and measurable factor associated with women’s ability to conceive. It’s one thing to say ultra-processed foods contribute to weight gain or cardiometabolic disease. But if they’re also affecting hormone pathways, that’s a much bigger issue — and it’s something people aren’t as aware of,” she says.

 

This latest study builds on previous research from the team, which linked ultra-processed foods to poor health outcomes.

 

“Processing affects foods in ways that aren’t reflected in nutrients alone – from chemical exposures during manufacturing to ingredients that displace whole, protective foods,” says Baric.

 

“It’s not about perfection – it’s about noticing how food is processed, choosing more foods in their natural states and picking ingredients you recognize. Even that simple shift can lower exposure to things we still don’t fully understand.”

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Are psychedelics better than antidepressants? New study says no

 

Psychedelic-assisted therapy may be no more effective than traditional antidepressants when patients know what drugs they are actually taking, according to a first-of-its kind analysis that compared how well each type of drug worked for major depression.

Psychedelic-assisted therapy has resisted placebo-controlled testing methods — the gold standard in clinical trial design. Due to their powerful subjective effects, nearly everyone in the trial knows whether they received a psychedelic or the placebo even if they are not told.

But in trials of antidepressants, participants may not figure out whether they have received the drug or a placebo, which makes it hard to compare them with psychedelics.

To get around this problem, researchers from UC San Francisco, UCLA, and Imperial College, London tried a different approach. They compared the results from psychedelic therapy trials to the results from so-called open-label trials of traditional antidepressants, in which the participants all knew they were getting an antidepressant. That way, both treatments benefitted equally from the positive effect of patients knowing that they were being given a drug instead of a placebo. 

The findings both surprised and disappointed them: there was virtually no difference.

“Unblinding is the defining methodological problem of psychedelic trials. What I wanted to show is that even if you compare psychedelics to open-label antidepressants, psychedelics are still much better,” said Balázs Szigeti, PhD, a clinical data scientist at UCSF’s Translational Psychedelic Research Program, who led the study. “Unfortunately, what we got is the opposite result — that they are the same, which is very surprising given the enthusiasm around psychedelics and mental health.” 

Szigeti is the co-first author of the paper with Zachary J. Williams, MD, PhD, of UCLA; Hannah Barnett, MSc, of Imperial College, London is also an author. The study appeared March 18 in JAMA Psychiatry.

A sobering view

The hype around the use of psychedelics like psilocybin, or “magic mushrooms,” and LSD, to treat such conditions as depression and addiction has grown in recent years as an increasing number of studies have shown promising results, particularly for people who haven’t responded to traditional antidepressants.

The new findings don’t mean that psychedelic therapy does not work — just that it does not work better than traditional antidepressants. Patients improved substantially from both types of treatments, reducing depression scores by about 12 points on a standard scale.

Part of what has made psychedelics seem impressive in trials than antidepressants is how much more those who received the psilocybin or LSD improved than those who did not get it.

But the researchers concluded that this was the result of the lack of blinding in psychedelic trials: those who got the drug improved more because they knew they had gotten it, while those who received a placebo did worse because they knew they did not. Whereas in trials of traditional antidepressants, the difference between the groups was much smaller, making it seem like the drugs weren’t that effective.

When this ‘knowing the treatment’ factor leveled out, the seeming advantage of psychedelics disappeared. 

“Psychedelics may still be a valuable treatment option,” Szigeti said. “But if we want to understand their true benefits, we have to compare them fairly — and when we do that, the advantage over standard antidepressants is much smaller than many people, including myself, expected.”

Ultra-processed foods linked with serious heart problems

 

Consuming more daily servings of ultra-processed foods is associated with a higher risk of adverse cardiac events, with Black Americans seeing amplified risk

Peer-Reviewed Publication

American College of Cardiology

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People who consumed over nine servings of ultra-processed foods per day on average were 67% more likely to suffer a major cardiac event than people consuming about one serving of such foods per day, in a study being presented at the American College of Cardiology’s Annual Scientific Session (ACC.26). Ultra-processed foods include many packaged and convenience foods, such as chips, crackers, frozen meals, processed meats, sugary drinks, breakfast cereals and breads.

With each additional daily serving, the risk of adverse events such as heart attacks, strokes and death from coronary heart disease or stroke increases by more than 5%, according to the findings. The association between ultra-processed food intake and adverse events was more pronounced among Black Americans compared with other racial groups.

“Ultra-processed foods are associated with an increased risk for heart disease, and while many of these products may seem like convenient on-the-go meal or snack options, our findings suggest they should be consumed in moderation,” said Amier Haidar, MD, a cardiology fellow at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston and the study’s lead author.

The research is among the first large studies to examine ultra-processed food consumption and heart disease risk in a racially diverse population of U.S. adults. The findings align with those of previous studies, most of which have been conducted in Europe, and offer additional context for the more diverse U.S. population.

The study is based on data from 6,814 U.S. adults without known heart disease who enrolled in the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA) between ages 45-84 years. Using food questionnaires, researchers assessed each participant’s daily intake of ultra-processed foods based on the NOVA classification system, which categorizes foods into four groupings ranging from unprocessed or minimally processed (e.g., corn on the cob) through ultra-processed (e.g., corn chips), with more lightly processed items falling in the middle (e.g., corn starch and canned corn). 

Participants in the highest quintile for ultra-processed food intake consumed 9.3 servings of such foods per day on average, while participants in the lowest quintile averaged 1.1 servings per day. Compared with the lowest quintile, participants in the highest quintile were 67% more likely to die from coronary heart disease or stroke or to experience a non-fatal heart attack, stroke or resuscitated cardiac arrest.

“We controlled for a lot of factors in this study,” Haidar said. “Regardless of the amount of calories you consumed per day, regardless of the overall quality of your diet, and after controlling for common risk factors like diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and obesity, the risk associated with higher ultra-processed food intake was still about the same.”

Haidar said these findings suggest that ultra-processed foods may contribute to cardiovascular risk through mechanisms beyond excess calories or poor overall diet quality, and that paying attention to how foods are processed alongside their nutrient content may be important for heart health.

Overall, each additional daily serving of ultra-processed foods was associated with a 5.1% increased risk of adverse cardiac events. However, this association was amplified among Black Americans, who saw a 6.1% increase in risk with each additional serving compared with a 3.2% increase per serving among non-Black individuals. Researchers said that minority-targeted food marketing and neighborhood environmental factors that make it harder to access less-processed foods have likely contributed to inequities in ultra-processed food consumption and associated health impacts among different racial groups.

There were several limitations to the study. Since the MESA study was not designed specifically to collect data on ultra-processed food intake, researchers said that the dietary questionnaire data relied on self-reporting by participants and assessed processed food intake by number of servings rather than individual food items.

The study also did not focus on the biological mechanisms involved, but previous research suggests that the high energy density, added sugars and fats, and effects on satiety and metabolism from ultra-processed foods drives weight gain, inflammation and the buildup of visceral fat tissue, all of which can contribute to heart disease.

Heidar said one way to reduce risk is to pay attention to the types of foods being consumed and to the food labels. Nutrition labels provide important information about the amount of added sugar, salt, fat and carbohydrates in each serving. These are often higher in ultra-processed foods compared with less-processed foods like plain oatmeal, nuts, beans and fresh or frozen produce.

The ACC published a 2025 Concise Clinical Guidance report in JACC endorsing a standardized front-of-package labeling system to help make sure that healthier choices are more visible, accessible and achievable for all consumers.

This study was published simultaneously in JACC Advances.

Closing your eyes might not help you hear better

 Most people will close their eyes when trying to concentrate on a faint sound. Many of us have been told that keeping our eyes closed helps us hear better — that it frees up our brains’ processing abilities and increases our auditory sensitivity. However, that strategy may sometimes backfire, particularly in environments with a lot of loud background noise.

In JASA, published on behalf of the Acoustical Society of America by AIP Publishing, researchers from Shanghai Jiao Tong University tested whether a person closing their eyes can really hear better in noisy environments.

To test this, volunteers listened to a collection of sounds through headphones amid background noise. Then, the volunteers adjusted the volume of the sounds until they could barely make them out over the background noise.

This test was conducted first with eyes closed, then with eyes open but looking at only a blank screen, then looking at a still picture corresponding to the sound, and finally, looking at a video matching up with the sound they were trying to hear.

“We found that, contrary to popular belief, closing one’s eyes actually impairs the ability to detect these sounds,” said author Yu Huang. “Conversely, seeing a dynamic video corresponding to the sound significantly improves hearing sensitivity.”

To find an explanation for this result, the researchers attached electroencephalography (EEG) devices to the participants to monitor their brain activity. They determined that closing the eyes puts a participant’s brain in a state of neural criticality, which more aggressively filters noises and quiet sounds, including the target sounds those participants were trying to detect.

“In a noisy soundscape, the brain needs to actively separate the signal from the background,” said Huang. “We found that the internal focus promoted by eye closure actually works against you in this context, leading to over-filtering, whereas visual engagement helps anchor the auditory system to the external world.”

The authors emphasize that this result is unique to noisy environments. With a calmer background, the conventional strategy of keeping their eyes closed likely does help people detect faint sounds. But because so much of our lives are spent surrounded by noise, it might be better to face the world with eyes wide open.

The researchers plan to continue their work exploring the relationship between vision and hearing.

“Specifically, we want to test incongruent pairings — for example, what happens if you hear a drum but see a bird?” said Huang. “Does the visual boost come from simply having the eyes open and processing more visual information, or does the brain require the visual and audio information to match perfectly? Understanding this distinction will help us separate the general effects of attention from the specific benefits of multisensory integration.”

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