The 'hunter-gather instincts' that helped our ancestors avoid starvation by seeking out high-calorie foods make us better at recalling where junk food is, a study found. Researchers from the Netherlands found that test subjects could more accurately recall the location of high-calorie foods than their lower-calorie counterparts. The findings indicate that our spatial memory — which allows us to remember the relative locations of objects — has evolved to prioritise high-calorie foods. Participants were then asked to indicate the location of each food or food odour sample on a map of the room. 'We found that individuals incidentally learned and more accurately recalled locations of high-calorie foods — regardless of explicit hedonic valuations or personal familiarity with foods,' the researchers wrote.

Source: Daily Mail October 08, 2020 15:01 UTC