Does Exercise Make You Smarter
Does Exercise Make You Smarter
Does Exercise Make You Smarter
Volume 15 70-77
Number 2 Spring 2022
2022
Part of the Biology Commons, and the Pharmacology, Toxicology and Environmental Health
Commons
Recommended Citation
Derkhidam, A. (2022). Does Exercise Make You Smarter?. The Science Journal of the Lander College of
Arts and Sciences, 15(2), 70-77. Retrieved from https://touroscholar.touro.edu/sjlcas/vol15/iss2/12
This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Lander College of Arts and Sciences at Touro Scholar.
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Does Exercise Make You Smarter?
Avi Derkhidam
Avi Derkhidam Is a candidate for a Bachelor of Science degree in Biology and will graduate in January 2024
Abstract
Physical exercise has been applauded for its beneficial cardiovascular and mental effects for decades. Recently, researchers have
begun to study exercise from a different perspective, focusing on the positive relationship between exercise and cognition. One
area of cognition highlighted in association with exercise is its positive impact on executive function. Executive function refers to
the collection of neurocognitive processes involved in goal-directed problem-solving. Improved levels of cognitive function have
been found to impact significant achievements throughout life. Because of this, the development, improvement, and preservation
of these functions are essential. While research has proven a correlation between exercise and improved cognition, the different
aspects that might influence its effectiveness are currently unclear. This research paper comprehensively analyzes various factors
such as type, intensity, and age groups that may modulate exercise’s effect on cognitive and executive functions. Aerobic exercise
was found to improve blood flow and increased transportation of nutrients and oxygen to areas in the central nervous system.
While anaerobic exercise has also been shown to raise insulin-like growth factor-1(IGF-1) concentrations, which enhances general
cognitive function, lactic acid accumulation was found to have a negative effect on cognitive improvement. Exercises that include
specific cognitive brain stimulation were found to directly improve that cognitive function. In terms of intensity, moderate exercise
was shown to be the most effective overall. In some areas, High intensity interval training (HIIT) exercise matched moderate
exercise’s effect on cognitive function and outperformed it in others. These findings were shown to be true for all age groups,
particularly among children, adolescents, and older adults. However, because the number of studies were limited, further research
is needed to understand the exact influence exercise has on young to middle-aged adults. Furthermore, while the study did find
that exercise can increase general cognition, it was unable to assess the exact impact of different types of exercise on specific
cognitive processes.
Introduction perspectives, organization, and completing tasks effectively
Hippocrates once said, “All parts of the body, if used in (Carlson et al., 2013).
moderation and exercised in labors to which each is accus- The development, enhancement, and preservation of
tomed, become thereby healthy and well developed and age cognitive processes is significant for all ages as they can play
slowly; but if they are unused and left idle, they become lia- a major role in a variety of areas. For instance, studies have
ble to disease, defective in growth and age quickly.” Physical found that cognitive abilities are key factors of academic
exercise has long been associated with increased physical success (Rohde & Thompson, 2007) and school readiness
health and prevention of disease. Studies have associated (Welsh et al., 2010) among children. Furthermore, higher
exercise with preventing physical illnesses such as cardio- cognitive function is found to positively impact career suc-
vascular disease, (Agarwal, 2012) colon cancer, hyperten- cess (Judge et al., 2010) and performance at work (Lang et
sion, and diabetes while improving mental health such as al., 2010). Additionally, as life expectancy increases there’s
reduced anxiety, stress, and depression (Vina et al., 2012). a rise of neurodegenerative diseases that cause cognitive
Additionally, new research found that exercise may reduce decline in the elderly, which severely diminishes the quality
the risk of acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), a of life (Batista & Pereira, 2016). Therefore, it is important
major cause of death in patients with the novel coronavi- to analyze how exercise can beneficially affect cognition.
rus (COVID-19) (COVID-19: Exercise May Help Prevent Besides for its well-established health benefits, exercise is
Deadly Complication, 2020). While the World Health cost-effective, non-pharmaceutical, and readily accessible.
Organization (WHO) recommends that adults should have While the research linking exercise to improved cognition
at least 150–300 minutes of exercise per week, it estimates has been established, the various factors that can impact
that 1 in every 4 adults and 4 out every 5 adolescents are its effectiveness is still unclear. This review will first analyze
insufficiently active (World Health Organization, 2020). several characteristics of exercise and discuss their under-
Recently, researchers have begun studying the positive lying biological mechanisms in order to determine how
association between exercise and cognition. Cognition is to maximize exercise’s benefits. Then, it will examine the
broadly defined as the mental process of gaining informa- pertinence of findings on various age groups and discuss
tion and understanding through intellect, observation, and recommended exercise regimens.
sensation (Merriam-Webster, 2018). One area of cognition
highlighted in association to exercise is executive function. Method
Executive function refers to the collection of neurocogni- Articles and studies for this paper were gathered using
tive processes involved in goal-directed problem solving, the EBSCO, PubMed, Google Scholar, and ProQuest data-
which includes inhibitory control, cognitive flexibility, and bases, with access granted by the Touro College Library.
working memory. These are basic skills that are used daily The articles found discuss several elements that modulate
such as self-awareness, self-control, understanding different exercise’s effect on cognition and executive function. This
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Does Exercise Make You Smarter?
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Avi Derkhidam
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Does Exercise Make You Smarter?
analyze the effects of various intensities, a review of the control with food consumption. They found that there
results is required in order to compare the findings and was a considerable improvement on the Stroop test
ascertain the beneficial levels of intensity. following the moderate exercise, while there was negli-
Researchers have used the inverted U theory as the gible improvement following the high-intensity exercise.
baseline hypothesis for their studies. A study was done to Similarly, while there was no correlation between the
measure the response rate of individuals after low, mod- amount of food consumed and the intensity of exercise,
erate, and high-intensity exercises. They proposed that the moderate exercisers selected the healthier choice.
the differences in intensity may affect different executive They exhibited an inhibitory response by selecting the
functions. Light and moderate intensity may benefit more healthier option rather than the unhealthy option. Again,
response inhibition in executive function which requires this supports the previous theory that moderate exercise
less effort and demand, while more intense exercises may affects executive function, specifically response inhibition.
benefit more complex tasks. The study used the P3 com- Additionally, these benefits seem to deteriorate as the
ponent of an event-related brain potential to measure intensity increases (Lowe et al., 2014).
the interactions between the brain and exercise. The P3 While the aforementioned studies seem to support
component is believed to show how the brain distrib- the inverted U theory that higher levels of intensity may
utes attentional resources and processes memory and be detrimental, recently researchers have been studying
is widely used as a measure for cognitive gains. Overall, how to utilize high-intensity exercise beneficially. Jiang
it was measured that the P3 amplitude increases during et al. studied an MRI of the brain after extreme fatigue
the light and moderate exercise but not during intense of the motor neurons. It was discovered that function-
exercise. According to this study, moderate exercise has al connectivity in subcortical nuclei, which are essential
a positive effect on executive functions, specifically allo- components of the motor control system, had increased
cating attention resources and memory processing. This significantly. These findings seem to indicate a stronger
seems to support the inverted U theory that the bene- connection between the motor and interneurons after
fits may be diminished by the exhaustion associated with high-intensity exercise. This may suggest a bio-feedback
higher levels of intensity. However, the study did find a system is regulating the motor neurons after fatigue to
shortened response time amongst all intensities, which adjust optimally to accommodate the intense vigorous
displays that intense exercise does have some positive exercise. It may seem that high-intensity exercise helps
effects (Kamijo et al., 2007) the body adjust to accommodate higher motor perfor-
In a different study, low and high-intensity exercise’s mance and may build a tolerance to evade the detrimen-
cognitive effects were measured using an MRI to compare tal effects (Jiang et al., 2016).
different cognitive effects on the brain. The MRI showed Furthermore, researchers may have devised a method
that low-intensity exercises increased resting-state func- to circumvent the possible cognitive deterioration caused
tional connectivity (rs-FC) in the left and right fronto- by the exhaustion of high-intensity exercises. In a study,
parietal networks. The frontal lobe in general is known Alves et al., (2014) analyzed the use of HIIT as an alter-
to control executive function, and specifically the fron- native to traditional exercises. HIIT consists of a series of
toparietal network areas are associated with cognitive brief, intermittent bursts of intense exercise separated by
functions and attentional control. In contrast, these areas intervals of rest or low-intensity exercise. HIIT can be ex-
were not highlighted during high-intensity exercises. The tremely beneficial as studies have found people to enjoy it
study aligns with the inverted U theory that proclaims more than moderate exercise (Bartlett et al., 2011) and is
that high-intensity exercise may deteriorate the positive considered to be time-efficient (this takes between 10-20
effects of exercise. It supports that the greatest benefits minutes). Alves et al. (2014) compared moderate exercise
of exercise are found between low and moderate inten- with HIIT by studying 22 subjects (9 men and 13 women).
sities and decrease with further intensification. The study The results concluded that compared to moderate ex-
proposed that the post-exhaustive state after high-inten- ercise, HIIT did indeed increase the cognitive function
sity exercises is what limits the positive cognitive aspects of selective attention tests, however, did not show im-
of exercise (Schmitt et al., 2019). provement on short-term memory (Alves et al., 2014).
An interesting study was conducted to highlight the According to this study, HIIT exercise enhances executive
benefits of moderate exercise. The study began by re- function just as much as moderate exercise and even ex-
searching whether a bout of moderate or high-intensity ceeds it in terms of selective attention.
exercise increased cognitive function.They then proceed- A similar study was conducted to analyze the effects of
ed to evaluate whether there was an effect on inhibitory HIIT on executive function.They studied 12 male subjects
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Avi Derkhidam
using the Stroop test. They discovered that both moder- et al., (2010) discovered that active children have bigger
ate and high-intensity exercise had an equivalent impact hippocampus volumes than less active children. An in-
on executive function immediately following exercise. crease in these areas has been associated with improved
However, as opposed to the moderate workouts, the memory, which lends itself to the possibility that exercise
HIIT had a positive effect on executive function for a full throughout childhood may result in long-term changes
30 minutes post-workout. These findings show that HIIT in brain structure and function (Chaddock et al., 2010).
may be a more effective technique for sustained improve- Additionally, multiple studies have found that an increase
ment of executive function over time than moderate ex- in exercise has led to higher grades and academic success
ercise (Tsukamoto et al., 2016). among children and adolescents (Brock et al., 2009;Ardoy
Research seems to indicate that while all levels of in- et al., 2014; Donnelly & Lambourne, 2011). These findings
tensities have some beneficial effect on cognition, there seem to support that the findings of this paper pertain
are preferred levels. Moderate exercise seems to be the to children and adolescents. These positive associations
optimal level while anything more intense seems to be strongly suggest that resources should be allocated on
detrimental, in line with the inverted U theory. However, physical education in schools and be incorporated into
researchers have identified a method to maximize higher the grade school curriculum (Álvarez-Bueno et al., 2017).
intensity workouts, by incorporating breaks throughout
the routine. These HIIT exercises were seen to match Young To Middle-Aged Adults
moderate exercise benefits in some executive functions The application of the findings of this paper on young
while outperforming it in other ones. to middle-aged individuals (ages 18-50) is significant for
a number of reasons. Besides for the fact that the bulk
Age Groups and Dose of the world’s population is in this age group, adults are
One interesting component of exercise’s effect on cogni- beginning, building, and establishing their careers and
tion is how the discussion varies between age groups. In relationships during this stage. Cognitive improvement
children and adolescents, the studies analyze how exer- has been found to affect work accomplishment and ca-
cise affects cognitive development and whether it should reer success (Judge et al., 2010; Lang et al., 2010) while
be implemented in the school curriculum. In adults, the providing a sense of fulfillment that creates an overall
discussion revolves around whether it improves cognitive wellness to the individual. A systematic review looked at
function significantly enough to affect career develop- the relationship between physical activity and cognitive
ment and job success. In the elderly, researchers investi- performance of adults in that age bracket (Cox et al.,
gate whether it can prevent cognitive decline and possibly 2016). The review confirmed that exercise is positively
even improve cognitive function. While exercise has been associated with executive function. As for the frequen-
proven to help cognition overall, a review of the stud- cy of exercise, researchers have not identified a specific
ies will help determine whether these findings hold true amount that is beneficial, rather the magnitude of the ef-
throughout different age groups, whether any group is fect rose as the intervention length increased (Ludyga et
favored, and the recommended exercise regimen. al., 2020). Interestingly, the review only discovered a lim-
ited collection of relevant literature (14 studies) explor-
Children and Adolescents ing this association because the majority of the research
The primary goal of children and adolescents during their focused on children and the elderly. Although a positive
childhood years (ages 4-18) involve succeeding in school, association was found, the small sample size disallows for
creating social experiences, and progression of skills. any unequivocal conclusions. This age group represents a
Therefore, the development of cognitive and executive significant period of people’s lives and it is imperative that
functions is crucial during this period. Memory, recall, con- more research is done to ascertain whether the findings
centration, and learning allows for better test-taking skills of this paper are fully pertinent to them (Cox et al., 2016).
and higher academic achievements. Self-awareness and
understanding other people’s perspectives help foster so- Elderly
cial connections. A meta-analysis done by Alvarez-Bueno In the elderly the focus hones in on whether exercise can
et al., (2017) on exercise’s relationship with cognitive and prevent dementia, preserve cognition, and even improve
executive functions in children and adolescents.They con- cognitive processes. At the same time, the exercise has to
cluded that exercise has substantial beneficial effects on be not too physically demanding in that the older adult
these functions including working memory, inhibition, and can still be capable of executing the exercise without risk-
cognitive flexibility. In a cross-sectional study, Chaddock ing injury. Researchers have found that exercise benefits
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Does Exercise Make You Smarter?
healthy elderly adults in significantly improving both benefit of different modalities of exercise on specific cog-
memory and executive functions. Additionally, exercise nitive functions. Therefore, in practice, it may be difficult
has been positively associated with helping elderly adults to target a specific cognition function, such as attention
with cognitive impairments prevent decline and improve or memory, with specific types of exercises in regard to
cognition in neurodegenerative diseases such as demen- intensity, type, and duration. Furthermore, as exercises’
tia and Alzheimer’s (Blondell et al., 2014).To maximize the effect on cognition is a relativity new area of study, long-
effects, the findings of this paper suggest a combination term studies are required to determine whether these
of aerobic and resistance exercises, as both have been effects are permanent or transient.
linked to positive changes in neurobiological pathways,
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