Is Exercise Really Good For The Brain? Here’s What The Science Says

The health benefits of physical activity are undeniable.

But a recent study based on data published over the past 30 years calls the famous adage into question. Men’s Sanine Corp. Resano (A healthy mind lives in a healthy body) and question the importance of exercise for both brain health and cognition.

A few days after the study was published, our team of health and neuroscience researchers published the results of a study of more than 250,000 people. Our results clearly support that both moderate and vigorous exercise have beneficial effects on cognitive function, furthering an important scientific debate.

who is right and who is wrong? This is what science says.

Is exercise useless for cognitive function?

of first study This is a review of 24 meta-analyses reexamining data from 11,266 healthy people using a more rigorous approach.

Nearly all of the 24 meta-analyses included in this review concluded that exercise had a positive effect on cognitive function, but the authors argue that the analyzes performed were suboptimal. For example, both baseline levels of physical activity and the scientific community’s tendency to publish only significant results were given little consideration, they note. Once these adjustments were made, the authors found results suggesting that exercise benefits were actually smaller than those estimated in previous meta-analyses, and may even be negligible.

Based on these findings, the authors argue that public health agencies such as the World Health Organization (WHO) should no longer state: Physical activity improves cognitive health, academic performance and executive function“at least until more reliable scientific evidence accumulates.”

Well, it didn’t take long for that proof to arrive.

Genetics and DNA to the rescue

of Second studyOur study, a genetic study of about 350,000 people, was published four days later on March 31, 2023. Our results provide scientific evidence for the cognitive benefits of moderate and vigorous physical activity.

This evidence is based on two-sample Mendelian randomization. This takes advantage of the random variations in our DNA that occur at conception, before we are born.

When comparing two humans, 99.9 percent of their genetic material is identical. DNA can be thought of as a long chain of building bricks called nucleotides, and between these two humans, every 1,000 bricks of her are different. Randomly placed bricks have her four types: thymine, adenine, guanine, and cytosine. A genetic mutation, for example, can result in one person having a cytosine brick at one place in her DNA and another person having a thymine brick at the same place in her DNA.

Our study’s initial sample consisted of 91,084 individuals and was used to identify genetic variants associated with differences in physical activity. Wrist-mounted motion sensor.

The second sample in our study consisted of 257,854 individuals and was used to test whether genetic variants associated with physical activity have proportional effects on cognitive function. Because this was the case, we were able to conclude that there is a causal relationship of physical activity to cognitive function.

Moderate exercise makes a big difference

Our study shows that physical activity improves cognitive function, but more importantly, the effect of moderate physical activity (brisk walking, cycling) is greater than that of vigorous physical activity (running, basketball). 1.5 times larger than This finding highlights that you don’t have to drive yourself to exhaustion to reap the cognitive benefits of exercise.

When all types of physical activity (including sedentary and light physical activity) were considered together, the results no longer affected cognitive function. This finding supports the importance of achieving at least moderate intensity to reap the cognitive benefits of physical activity.

Our result is Recent research The paper emphasizes that the duration and intensity of exercise are important for the release of a protein called BDNF in the brain. This protein is involved in the generation of new neurons, new connections between these neurons, and new blood vessels to nourish the neurons.

Thus, this protein, whose production increases during exercise, is one of the physiological mechanisms that explain the beneficial effects of physical activity on cognitive function.the very existence of this Explanation mechanism The results further support the beneficial effects of exercise on brain function.

It’s never too late to start

The discrepancy in results between meta-analytic reviews and genetics-based studies may be explained by several differences.

First, this review is for healthy people only, which was not the case in our study. Second, our study distinguished between light, moderate, and vigorous physical activity, whereas the review did not. Finally, our genetic approach assesses long-term effects over a lifetime, whereas the review is based on interventions lasting from he month to her two years.

Since we’re dealing with the temporal aspect of physical activity here, it’s important to remember that it’s never too late to start exercising.In fact, in 2019 study showed that starting activity later in life has the same positive effects on overall health as staying active throughout life.

Conclusion: Hasty decisions are never good

Based on our findings, physical activity still appears to be beneficial for brain health and cognition. Moreover, in the current socio-political climate of widespread mistrust of science, we should not rush to conclusions based on a single study that contradicts years of research but based on the exact same data.

As is often the case in science, it is wiser not to make hasty decisions and wait for additional research before proposing changes to physical activity guidelines. The accumulation of converging evidence from various research teams should be a prerequisite for changing the public health message. As this article shows, we are still far from that stage and the benefits of physical activity for a range of physical and mental health outcomes are still undeniable.

Matthew P. BoisgontierAssociate Professor, Faculty of Health Sciences University of Ottawa/University of Ottawa and Boris ChevalSenior Researcher, Swiss Center for Emotional Science, University of Geneva

This article is reprinted from conversation Under Creative Commons License.read Original work.