Unsurprisingly, sitting in front of the television for long hours, without doing much exercise, is bad for your health.
Who would have thought it, eh?
But a new study has found that it may actually be a lot more damaging for you, a lot earlier in life, with TV binge-watching being linked to an earlier decline in brain function than ever thought before.
According to TIME, researchers at the Northern California Institute for Research and Education looked at data from 18-30-year-olds over the course of 25-years to come to their conclusion.
In the study, those that claimed to watch the most television (three hours or more, for those that are wondering at the benchmark) and also did minimal exercise (less than two and half hours a week, FYI) were found to have the greatest decline in cognitive functions throughout the study.
Age had little to do with it, with the effects being seen before participants reached middle age.
Researcher Tina Hoang revealed that the level of inactivity ‘affects cognitive functioning even younger than we realised.’
So, what does this mean?
Well, these findings show that memory, brain processing speed, the ability to forward plan and carry out tasks were all negatively impacted by an inactive life in front of the box.
Next time you’re settling down in front of your favourite Netflix series, you may want to plot some outdoors time into your diary first.