--- title: Exercising Might Help You Make Healthier Food Choices, Study Says description: A new study says that beginning an exercise routine may also help you eat healthier foods. Here's how to get started. canonical: https://time.com/5517552/exercise-eat-healthier/ author: Jamie Ducharme article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2019-02-06T15:52:51.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T22:38:49.676Z article:section: Health og:title: Exercising Might Help You Make Healthier Food Choices, Study Says og:description: Here's how og:url: https://time.com/5517552/exercise-eat-healthier/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6abbbd24f71b12e9/6988d4708fd2eedb6e357d84/time-magazine-exercise-fitness-health-bethan-mooney-07.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1203 og:image:height: 677 og:image:alt: time-magazine-exercise-fitness-health-bethan-mooney-07 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Exercising Might Help You Make Healthier Food Choices, Study Says twitter:description: Here's how twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6abbbd24f71b12e9/6988d4708fd2eedb6e357d84/time-magazine-exercise-fitness-health-bethan-mooney-07.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Exercising Might Help You Make Healthier Food Choices, Study Says > Sponsored content. 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Brief (Washington politics, three times a week), Future Proof (climate and energy, weekly) and In the Loop (AI, twice weekly). All are free at time.com/newsletters and together reach more than 1.1 million engaged readers. #### Which TIME newsletter should I subscribe to? It depends on what you follow. For a daily briefing, The Brief. For health, Health Matters. For Washington politics, D.C. Brief. For AI and technology, In the Loop. For climate and energy as a business story, Future Proof. For culture recommendations, Worth Your Time. For how TIME's journalism gets made, Inside TIME. Readers can select any combination at time.com/newsletters. #### Are TIME's newsletters free? Yes. All seven TIME newsletters are free to join at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes TIME's newsletters? TIME journalists write them. Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement.  by [Jamie Ducharme](https://time.com/author/jamie-ducharme/)  ## Jamie Ducharme Ducharme is a contributor to TIME. Feb 6, 2019 3:52 PM UTC  Bethan Mooney for TIME  by [Jamie Ducharme](https://time.com/author/jamie-ducharme/)  ## Jamie Ducharme Ducharme is a contributor to TIME. Feb 6, 2019 3:52 PM UTC Getting healthy can be a daunting endeavor. It can seem impossible to [get active](http://time.com/5438387/exercise-guidelines-benefits/), [eat better](http://time.com/5469370/how-to-eat-healthy-diet/), [sleep more](http://time.com/4673503/dreamy-sleep-gadgets/), [stay hydrated](http://time.com/4873725/dehydration-drink-water/) and do the many other things your [doctor says you should do](http://time.com/5484042/healthy-new-years-resolutions/), all at once. But recent research suggests there’s a single best place to begin. According to a [study](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41366-018-0299-3) published in the _International Journal of Obesity, s_tarting an exercise regimen may also inspire you to eat more healthfully. “It’s hard to start a diet. Most people feel deprived from the get-go,” says study co-author Molly Bray, chair of the department of nutritional sciences at the University of Texas at Austin. “Instead of taking something away, you can add physical activity to your life, and the consequent changes may be significant changes in the way you eat.” For the study, researchers recruited more than 2,500 college students who said they didn’t diet and exercised for less than 30 minutes a week. The students were put on a 15-week aerobic exercise plan that involved doing guided cardio for 30-60 minutes, three times a week. Each person was asked to fill out a diet questionnaire at the beginning and end of the study. They were told not to change their eating habits. But many of them did anyway. About 2,000 stuck with the exercise plan, and they were more likely than those who didn’t to eat healthier without being told to, the researchers found. Many of the exercisers started eating more nutritious foods, like fruits, vegetables, lean meats, fish and nuts, and fewer [fried foods](http://time.com/5509669/fried-foods-death-risk/), soda and snack foods. The more — and more vigorously — a person exercised, the more their diet tended to improve, the researchers found. Longer exercise duration was associated with a decrease in preference for foods characteristic of the standard western diet, such as red meat, fried foods and snack foods. Meanwhile, high-intensity exercise was associated with an increase in preference for healthy foods. Overall, Bray says, this means “compliance with the exercise program was associated with a move toward eating healthier overall.” The study didn’t look at why working out seemed to spur healthy eating — future studies will focus on that question, as well as what impact strength-training might have on diet, Bray says — but psychology and biology are likely both responsible. “There’s a lot of [research](http://time.com/2933971/how-to-motivate-yourself-3-steps-backed-by-science/) that positive results fuel adherence and persistence and other changes psychologically,” Bray says. “Some people may be saying, ‘Wow, look, my shorts feel looser. I’m going to work on my eating behavior.'” But Bray says she doesn’t think conscious effort can explain the whole phenomenon. Plenty of [research](http://time.com/3956256/brain-exercise-effect/) suggests that exercise can change brain function, and she says this rewiring may be behind the urge to eat more healthfully. “I really do think exercise is [altering neural processing](http://time.com/4752846/exercise-brain-health/) in your brain. The stimulation of your brain that occurs with high-intensity exercise is what changes lots of things about your body,” Bray says, including what it wants to eat. The effect likely doesn’t work both ways, Bray says; cleaning up your diet probably won’t make you want to hop on the treadmill. Though her study did not directly address that relationship, Bray says she does not believe that food choices can create brain changes the same way physical activity may. Plus, people probably find it easier to start an exercise routine than a restrictive diet. “Add something to your life — what a good health message,” Bray says. “This is a gift you’re giving yourself, and other really significant health changes can occur along the way.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5517552/exercise-eat-healthier/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5517552/exercise-eat-healthier/"},"headline":"Exercising Might Help You Make Healthier Food Choices, Study Says","datePublished":"2019-02-06T15:52:51.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T22:38:49.676Z","description":"Here's how","url":"https://time.com/5517552/exercise-eat-healthier/","keywords":["Exercise & Fitness","Diet & Nutrition","healthytime"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6abbbd24f71b12e9/6988d4708fd2eedb6e357d84/time-magazine-exercise-fitness-health-bethan-mooney-07.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Jamie Ducharme","jobTitle":"Ducharme is a contributor to TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/jamie-ducharme/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6abbbd24f71b12e9/6988d4708fd2eedb6e357d84/time-magazine-exercise-fitness-health-bethan-mooney-07.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"time-magazine-exercise-fitness-health-bethan-mooney-07","caption":"","creditText":"Bethan Mooney for TIME","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/exercisefitness/","name":"Exercise & Fitness"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5517552/exercise-eat-healthier/","name":"Exercising Might Help You Make Healthier Food Choices, Study Says"}}]}] ```