How ultra-processed food took over your shopping basket

The long read: It’s cheap, attractive and convenient, and we eat it every day – it’s difficult not to. But is ultra-processed food making us ill and driving the global obesity crisis?

Girls beginning puberty almost a year earlier than in 1970s

Onset of glandular breast tissue development has shifted by three months per decade

Human hibernation: the restoring effects of hiding away in winter

How do you flourish through the darkest months of the year? Take a lesson from a sleepy dormouse…

What a to-do! How to write the perfect list

Looking for freedom from that familiar nagging feeling? Here’s how to get stuff done without overwhelming yourself

I’m a psychotherapist, but therapy didn’t ease my grief

A sudden bereavement tore my life apart. But even though I’m a trained therapist, I couldn’t find comfort on the couch

Our face mask future: Do they really help beat flu, coronavirus and pollution?

Huge numbers of people are wearing face masks – in Japan and South Korea there have been reports of stores selling out. But experts are divided on how effective they are

It’s time to tune in: why listening is the real key to communication

Whether at work or at home, success depends on how good a listener you are

‘Don’t blame the mirror for your ugly face’: why foreign idioms rule

Human brains make the same observations across place, time and culture. I collect these phrases as others do stamps

The poo panacea: inside the strange, surprising world of faecal transplants

When treating antibiotic-resistant infections, injecting patients with other people’s excrement can be highly effective. Could it be the answer to dementia, anorexia and obesity too?

If you are confronting a midlife crisis, put up a fight – and take up boxing

At 50, I knew I was trapped in a gentle, terminal decline. But when I stumbled on boxing, I found the challenge I needed, says Marion Dunn