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Aerobic Exercise Beats Muscle Training in Improving Brain Function
Choose rather to be strong of soul than strong of body.
— Pythagoras
As intelligent as Pythagoras was, he was almost certainly wrong in his intuitive hard-edged separation of body versus soul. It hasn’t been long since I last wrote about the wonders of physical exercise for brain and mental function. But new studies have continued in the meantime, and it’s important to stay on top of them. Scientific progress is incremental, and evidence in support of a particular theory either continues to accumulate or wavers until a few killer studies finally disprove the theory.
By keeping up to date with evidence as it appears, we can minimize the chance that we hold outdated or erroneous assumptions about how the world or our bodies work. So is there still a strong case in support of regular aerobic activity as a cognitive enhancer? And does aerobic activity beat muscle training in boosting our mental function?
When we think about cognitive function and possible activities to enhance, stimulate, or protect it, we typically consider mental exercises; this is what makes brain training and problem-solving games so popular. We feel that our cognitive ability is being challenged and that our performance is improving in the…
