Effects of Acute Aerobic Exercise on Executive Function in Older Women

• Main Author: Roseann Peiffer, Lynn A. Darby, Adam Fullenkamp, Amy L. Morgan
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: University of Uludag 2015-09-01
• Series: Journal of Sports Science and Medicine
• Subjects: Executive function; aerobic exercise; reaction time
• Online Access: http://www.jssm.org/abstresearcha.php?id=jssm-14-574.xml

Acute aerobic exercise may increase cognitive processing speed among tasks demanding a substantial degree of executive function. Few studies have investigated executive function after acute exercise in older adults across various exercise intensities. Healthy females 60-75 years of age (n = 11) who were not on medications completed 20-min exercise sessions at a moderate (50%VO2max) exercise intensity and a vigorous (75%VO2max) exercise intensity. Modified flanker tasks (reaction times) and d2 tests of sustained and selective attention (components of executive function) were completed before, immediately after, and 30-min post-exercise. Results indicated that older adult females had improved scores on the modified flanker task reaction times (RTT, RTI, RTC) and d2 tests immediately after both moderate and vigorous intensity aerobic exercise. Some of these effects were maintained 30 min post-exercise. These findings suggest that an acute bout of exercise, regardless of intensity, can improve performance on tests of executive function in older women.