"We see that fitter people have better brain health, so we now need to ask whether actually making people fitter will improve their brain health. Finding this out is our next step."
Sound Body, Sound Mind: Physically Fit People Have Stronger, Sharper Brains
It’s no secret that exercise can be beneficial from a psychological perspective. A session at the gym or jog around the neighborhood can help us clear our mind, reset our thoughts, and improve our mood. Now, a team of German scientists have discovered that keeping oneself physically fit is also associated with better brain structure and functioning in young adults.
The research team believe their findings indicate that if a person can improve their physical fitness, it may lead to improved cognitive ability, including elevated memory retention and superior problem solving.
There have been a number of previous studies that concluded exercise is beneficial for the brain, but most of that research failed to account for numerous underlying variables that may have skewed their findings. Examples of such variables include study participants’ body weights, blood glucose levels, age, and education. Furthermore, most of these studies focused on the effect exercise has on mood and behavior, not brain structure and mental functioning.
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EXERCISE IS BRAIN MEDICINE
