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Loading...Home Cooking Makes You Live Longer
If you’re the type of person whose idea of cooking dinner is hitting speed dial for your favorite take-out, take note: changing your habits could lengthen your lifespan. A new study published in the Cambridge University Press has shown that people who cook at home at least five days a week have a 47 percent higher chance of being alive 10 years later.
The study, which focused on a group of 1,888 men and women 65 years and older living in Taiwan quizzed participants about lifestyle factors. Participants answered questions about their cooking habits, household circumstances, diets, education, shopping habits, transportation and smoking.
The survey took place ten years ago; at the time, 43 percent of participants never cooked, 17 percent cooked 1-2 times per week, 9 percent cooked 3-5 times a week, and 31 percent cooked five or more times each week. Recently, researchers caught up with the participants to see how many were still living. Examining the answers of participants who hadn’t passed away with those who had, they found that frequent cooking factored into survival.
Women — particularly unmarried women — were more likely to be frequent cooks, and fared better in survival. That’s not to say that home cooking is a silver bullet; women already tend to live longer than men, and culturally, are more practiced at cooking. And general good health also made cooking possible, since cooking requires trips to the store, shopping and walking.
Still, after controlling for those factors, researchers still found reason to believe that home cooking can lead to longevity.
All other factors taken into account, “the relationship between frequent cooking and mortality is strong,”says the study’s lead author, Professor Mark Wahlquist of the National Health Research Institute in Taiwan. “It is part of physical, mental, and indeed social activity,” leading those who do it to maintain good health in more ways than one.
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Photo Credit: ReneS
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Recent Comments from Causes
Thank you.
Wow! Thanks for information...
Great - I try to boycott all China products. In Canada most packaging seems to hide the "made in China".…
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49 comments
+ add your ownHave always loved to cook from scratch, food is tastier that way especially if grown in one's own garden even if the garden is a balcony garden. No pesticides. There are also local farmer's market, meat raised organically. One always knows what is going into the dinner. Even dandelion salads are great mixed with spinach.
Noted.
Nothing compares to home cooking!
At least with home cooking you know EXACTLY what you're putting in to the food you and your family are eating.
Thanks for sharing!
Why do people think that living longer is a good thing?
hmmm...
I think it depends on who's cooking and what they cook. I hate when they make these blanket statements. I lived with a friend whose cooking would cut short most people's lives.
good to know
You ain't a kidd'n!
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