14 DAY TRIAL // According to a new research whose findings are to be presented today during the Canadian Cardiovascular Congress, physical exercise does more than just trim one's waistline: it improves cognitive functions.
To cut a long story short: by exercising twice a week, individuals around the age of 49 will both lose weight and grow smarter.
Apparently, the specialists who carried out this study have decided to investigate how regular physical exercise affects the brain after hearing several people who exercised quite often saying that this healthy habit also made them feel “sharper.”
As Dr. Martin Juneau from the Montreal Heart Institute puts it, “If you talk to people who exercise, they say they feel sharper. Now we've found a way to measure that.”
In order to test this theory, these researchers convinced a group of otherwise sedentary adults to take part in high-intensity interval training for a period of four months.
Thus, these adults were made to exercise twice a week, and their workout routine mainly revolved around bike riding and circuit weight training. As was to be expected, their body mass index improved and their waist circumference was significantly reduced.
As well as this, their thinking and decision making abilities improved. The researchers speculate that this improvement in terms of cognitive functions comes as a result of an increased blood flow to the brain.
Given the fact that, as an individual heads towards his/her 50s, cognitive functions tend to decline, it comes as good news that something can be done to tackle this issue.
Eurek! Alert quotes Dr. Beth Abramson, a spokesperson for the Heart and Stroke Foundation, who made a case of how, “At least 150 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity per week can make a huge difference to manage risk factors for heart disease and stroke.”
Furthermore, “The are many benefits of exercise – we know it can make us feel better. This suggests it can make us 'think better' as well.”