Evidence for a second meal cognitive effect: glycaemic responses to high and low glycaemic index evening meals are associated with cognition the following morning

Lamport, D. J. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4592-0439, Hoyle, E., Lawton, C. L., Mansfield, M. W. and Dye, L. (2011) Evidence for a second meal cognitive effect: glycaemic responses to high and low glycaemic index evening meals are associated with cognition the following morning. Nutritional Neuroscience, 14 (2). pp. 66-71. ISSN 1028-415X doi: 10.1179/1476830511Y.0000000002

Abstract/Summary

Low glycaemic index (GI) foods consumed at breakfast can enhance memory in comparison to high-GI foods; however, the impact of evening meal GI manipulations on cognition the following morning remains unexplored. Fourteen healthy males consumed a high-GI evening meal or a low-GI evening meal in a counterbalanced order on two separate evenings. Memory and attention were assessed before and after a high-GI breakfast the following morning. The high-GI evening meal elicited significantly higher evening glycaemic responses than the low-GI evening meal. Verbal recall was better the morning following the high-GI evening meal compared to after the low-GI evening meal. In summary, the GI of the evening meal was associated with memory performance the next day, suggesting a second meal cognitive effect. The present findings imply that an overnight fast may not be sufficient to control for previous nutritional consumption.