Whether it is a novel by Charles Dickens or Jackie Collins, reading for pleasure is good for brain health. Regularly enjoying a good book has been linked to improved memory, empathy and mental health, among other benefits. This may be through its effect on brain structure or by building cognitive reserve.聽

鈥淩eading is like a cognitive workout,鈥� says at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics in the Netherlands, who wasn鈥檛 involved in the research. But reading for pleasure has plummeted over the past 20 years, which may partly be due to us spending more time on social media.聽

In the latest research, at the University of Cambridge and her colleagues pooled evidence on the effects of reading for pleasure from five surveys and eight long-term studies, with tens of thousands of participants among them.聽

Many of these linked reading to greater volume of grey matter 鈥� part of the brain that supports thinking and memory 鈥� and stronger communication between brain regions.聽This may be how reading builds cognitive reserve, says Sahakian. This is the brain鈥檚 ability to defend against ageing and adapt to damage, which is heavily shaped by our lifestyle.

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Reading was also repeatedly linked to improved mental health. One study found that children who began reading for pleasure early in life had moderately larger brain surface areas and volumes in regions linked to emotional control. This feels particularly important amid evidence that youth mental health is worse today than it was decades ago, says Sahakian.

Overall, the team linked reading for pleasure to reduced stress, greater empathy, enhanced wellbeing and reduced loneliness. In childhood specifically, reading was associated with better attention, memory, executive function, academic achievement and fewer mental health problems. Among older adults, it was linked to a lower risk of cognitive decline.

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Reading fiction may be particularly important by exposing us to narratives that allow our brain to practice how we might respond to life events, improving its predication abilities.聽It may also make us feel connected聽to the characters, reducing feelings of loneliness.聽

Non-fiction may stimulate different parts of the brain, says Sahakian. But what is important is that you 鈥渞ead for enjoyment, as you will read more often and longer鈥�, she says.

Eating too much salt has been linked to eczema after researchers found people with the skin condition have elevated levels of sodium in their urine.聽

worldwide have eczema, which causes dry, cracked and itchy skin. Common triggers include irritants found in soaps and detergents, as well as environmental or food allergens. Previous research has also in children.聽

To see if salt may play a role, at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), and her colleagues examined urine sample data from more than 215,800 adults in the UK Biobank study, of whom more than 10,800 had eczema.

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The researchers used a urine sample from each participant to estimate their urinary sodium excretion over 24 hours. , making the waste product a relatively reliable way of gauging someone鈥檚 salt consumption.

Overall, the study participants excreted an estimated 3.01 grams of sodium in their urine over 24 hours, on average. The recommended sodium intake for adults , equivalent to 6 grams, or one teaspoon, of salt.聽

The researchers found that for every additional gram of sodium that the participants excreted, their odds of having been diagnosed with eczema rose by 11 per cent. Their risk of having eczema at that time also increased by 16 per cent.聽

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The team acknowledges that a single urine sample may not accurately reflect a person鈥檚 typical salt intake. But in another part of their study, the researchers surveyed a separate group of more than 13,000 adults in the US about their daily diet, finding further correlations between a high salt intake and eczema.聽

Previous research has shown that , triggering some inflammatory pathways, says Abuabara. People with eczema have an overly active immune response to allergens or irritants, which causes skin inflammation and subsequent symptoms.

Although the study shows an association between high urinary sodium levels and eczema, further work is needed to establish that the former causes the latter, says team member , also at UCSF.

It is too early to say that lowering dietary sodium levels can reduce eczema severity or the risk of developing it in the first place, says at King鈥檚 College London.

Abuabara says her team will soon start enrolling people to take part in a study funded by the US National Institutes of Health looking at the relationship between dietary sodium, levels of sodium on the skin and eczema severity.

Restricting your eating window to just 8 hours a day, a popular type of intermittent fasting, has been linked to a higher risk of dying from heart disease. But some scientists argue that people with pre-existing health conditions may unknowingly opt for intermittent fasting if their symptoms or treatments affect their appetite and the quality of our diet is probably more important than when we eat.

Time-restricted eating has previously been linked to improved , and , but its long-term effects are unclear.

To learn more, at the Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China and his colleagues studied around 20,000 adults, roughly evenly split between men and women, who participated in the US National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Their average age was 49 and just under three-quarters of them were non-Hispanic white people.

Every year from 2003 to 2018, the survey鈥檚 participants self-reported their dietary information. The researchers then matched this against the death records between 2003 to 2019 from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Participants were only included if they were aged 20 or older and had completed two diet questionnaires within their first year of the survey.

Over an average follow-up period of eight years, the team found that those who ate during an 8-hour daily window didn鈥檛 live longer than those with a more traditional eating schedule of 12 to 16 hours, despite intermittent fasting often being lauded for its longevity benefits.

The researchers also found that those who followed an 8-hour eating schedule were 91 per cent more likely to die from heart disease over the follow-up period than those who ate over 12 to 16 hours.

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For those diagnosed with heart conditions before the study, eating over an 8 to 10-hour window was linked to a 66 per cent higher risk of death from heart disease compared with those who ate over 12 to 16 hours. Among those diagnosed with cancer, eating over a window of more than 16 hours was associated with a lower risk of death from the condition than a more constricted eating schedule.

The study 鈥� presented at the American Heart Association (AHA) Epidemiology and Prevention conference in Chicago 鈥� doesn鈥檛 prove that time-restricted eating caused any of these deaths, says Zhong.

It is important to consider the participants鈥� reasons for practising time-restricted eating, says at the Intermountain Heart Institute in Salt Lake City, Utah. Some might have adopted this pattern intentionally, while others could have had limited eating windows due to health conditions or treatments that affected their appetite, he says.

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Some may have also had a restricted eating schedule because of limited access to food, says , former chair of the AHA nutrition committee. Research suggests that . 鈥淲e also know nothing about the healthfulness of the foods they ate,鈥� says Carson.

In their paper, the authors acknowledge their research relied on self-reported dietary information that may be inaccurate. They plan to investigate if the findings apply to people of a broader range of ethnicities and how fasting might increase the risk of harmful health outcomes.

People who want to reduce their likelihood of dying prematurely 鈥渟hould aim for an overall heart-healthy dietary pattern, regardless of the time of day they eat鈥�, says Carson. Those who wish to start intermittent fasting should speak to their doctor beforehand, says Horne.