Mental Health and Physical Activity最新文献

Background

Studies have shown that both mind-body and physical exercises are effective in reducing depressive symptoms. However, the pooled evidence on neurobiological mechanisms underlying the antidepressant effect of exercise has rarely been examined. This article systematically reviewed and evaluated the existing evidence about neurobiological responses to mind-body and physical exercises in individuals with symptoms of depression.

Methods

We followed PRISMA guidelines and searched databases for relevant randomized controlled trials published up to September 12, 2022. Studies that investigated the neurobiological mechanisms of exercise interventions on depressive symptoms were included.

Results

Thirty-two articles were included for review, representing a total sample of 1,820 individuals with depressive symptoms. Our findings demonstrated that cortisol and BDNF were the common potential mediator underlying the antidepressant effects of both mind-body and physical exercises. Additionally, mind-body exercise was shown to decrease IL-6, while physical exercise was found to improve VO₂max/peak, which might also shed light on the linkage between exercise and depressive symptoms. In addition, enhanced EEG frontal alpha asymmetry and increased right hippocampal volume may also explain the antidepressant effects of mind-body exercise and physical exercise, respectively. Other neurobiological mechanisms remain inconclusive due to the limited number of studies and research quality.

Conclusions

Exercises were likely to alleviate depressive symptoms through regulation of HPA axis activity, enhancement of neurogenesis, reduction of pro-inflammatory cytokines and improvement of cardiorespiratory fitness. More high-quality studies on the neurobiological responses to mind-body or physical exercises are warranted for a more comprehensive understanding of their antidepressant effects.

Objectives

Digital platforms (e.g., Facebook®, YouTube®) were a potential alternative for supporting physical activity (PA) practice during the COVID-19 pandemic. We examined the association between the use of digital platforms for PA practice and the trajectory of depressive and anxiety symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic in adults.

Methods

We analyzed data from the PAMPA cohort, a longitudinal study in southern Brazil. Participants (n = 663) were asked about the type of platform (social media, streaming, fitness app) they used for PA during the pandemic. Depressive and anxiety symptoms were examined in waves June 2020 (wave one) to June 2022 (wave four).

Results

Participants were mostly female (79.5%), with a mean age of 37.6 (SD: 13.5) years. Four in ten adults (n = 271) reported use of digital platforms for physical activity during the COVID-19 pandemic. Using digital platforms for PA was associated with a faster decline in depressive symptoms over follow-up. Participants who used digital platforms for PA in wave two showed less frequent depressive symptoms in wave three compared to their counterparts. The use of streaming services and WhatsApp for PA practice were associated with a faster decline in depressive symptoms during the pandemic. There was no interaction between the use of digital platforms and anxiety symptoms.

Conclusion

Using digital platforms for PA practice was associated with an attenuated trajectory of depressive symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic in adults.

Purpose/objective

Anxiety is prevalent and poorly managed among persons with multiple sclerosis (MS). Physical activity (PA) may reduce anxiety, yet little is known about PA and its theory-based correlates in persons with MS who report elevated anxiety. Such research is important for the design and delivery of behavioral interventions targeting PA for the treatment of anxiety in MS. This study examined PA and social cognitive theory (SCT) variables (i.e., self-efficacy, barriers, outcome expectations, goal-setting/planning, social support, and functional limitations) in persons with MS who report elevated anxiety.

Research method/design

324 participants with MS (aged 48.5[9.5] years) completed SCT, anxiety, and PA measures, and wore accelerometers for 7 days as a device-measure of PA. The sample was categorized into subsamples with non-elevated (n = 218) and elevated anxiety (n = 106) based on the cut-off score of 8 for the Hospital Anxiety Depression Scale Anxiety subscale. We examined levels of PA and SCT variables between the two subsamples.

Results

There were no differences in PA levels between the subsamples when controlling for group differences in age, education, and disease duration. Social support was lower and perceived functional limitations were higher in those with elevated anxiety and were significantly associated with PA. Regression analyses identified planning, social support, and perceived functional limitations as correlates of PA in those with elevated anxiety.

Conclusions/Implications

This study may guide research on SCT-based behavioral interventions for increasing PA as an approach for reduced anxiety among persons with MS and elevated anxiety by targeting exercise planning, social support, and perception of functional limitations.

The retinal microcirculation serves a proxy of cerebrovascular function and has been linked with both physical fitness and cognitive function. We investigated the role of physical fitness for the development of executive function in children as well as its mediation by microvascular health. Using a cross-lagged panel design, 365 children aged six to eight years completed a baseline assessment, which was followed up after four years. Retinal vessel analysis was performed on digital retinal images obtained with a fundus camera. Additionally, a computerized Flanker task was administered to assess the inhibitory aspect of executive function. With regard to physical fitness tests, participants completed a shuttle run and 20-m sprints. Path-analyses showed that higher performance on the shuttle run and 20-m sprint at baseline were both associated with lower reaction times on the Flanker task at follow-up, when autoregressive effects were accounted for. Stages achieved on the shuttle run at baseline were further related to narrowing of retinal venular diameters, which in turn predicted performance on the Flanker task. However, the direct relation of physical fitness components to reaction time was higher compared to the indirect relation via retinal venular diameters. High physical fitness contributes to the development of cognitive abilities from childhood to preadolescence. This association is not mediated by retinal vessel diameters, while the microvascular phenotype of narrower retinal venules is independently related to a better development of information processing and inhibitory control.

There is a growing amount of experimental evidence demonstrating therapeutic chronic effects of exercise (e.g., resistance exercise, running, and walking) on PTSD symptoms. However, it is currently unclear how individuals with PTSD experience exercise within individual exercise sessions (e.g., pleasurable or distressing), and if these acute experiences influence PTSD symptoms over time. Purpose: The objective of this study was to examine the acute effects of high intensity resistance exercise on affect, perceived arousal, and distress among individuals who screened positive for PTSD, using a randomized controlled design. Additionally, this study sought to explore longitudinal relations among affect, arousal, distress, and PTSD symptom severity. Methods: This study analyzed pooled data from two methodologically similar randomized controlled trials (i.e., a pilot and replication study). Participants (n = 52) were randomly assigned to exercise or non-exercise time-matched control. Data were analyzed with a series of longitudinal mixed-effects regression models. Results: The analyses suggest that positive affect increased, and distress decreased significantly during exercise sessions, relative to control. Independent of group, increases in positive affect and decreases in distress also significantly predicted decreases in PTSD symptom severity over the course of the study. Conclusions: Taken together, these findings suggest that high intensity resistance exercise is safe for individuals who screen positive for PTSD, pleasurable, and may have a therapeutic impact on trauma survivors. No evidence for symptom exacerbation was found. Future experimental studies are needed to verify these findings and determine if the observed relationships are similar for other exercise modes, durations, and intensities.

Approximately 18% of older adults experience mild-to-severe depressive symptoms in the U.S., which in turn can negatively affect their physical and cognitive health. It is widely acknowledged that physical activity has a positive impact on mood and depression and is highly recommended for symptom management across all ages. Little is known, however, about whether elevated depressive symptoms interfere with the potential benefits of chronic exercise on physical outcomes such as mobility improvements in older adults. In this secondary data analysis of the Lifestyle Interventions and Independence for Elders (LIFE) study, we analyzed data from 1545 older adults (mean age = 78.8, 66.7% female) randomized to either a physical activity or health education intervention with an average of 2.2 years of follow-up. We evaluated whether the presence of clinically relevant depressive symptoms (defined as a rescaled score of ≥16 on the Center for Epidemiological Studies-Depression [CES-D]-11 scale) moderated the effect of a chronic physical activity intervention on incident major mobility disability (MMD), objectively measured as the ability to walk 400 m and assessed every 6 months. There were significant main effects of both the physical activity intervention (p = 0.018) and clinically relevant depression (p < 0.001) on incident MMD, but we found no evidence of moderation by depression status (interaction p-value = 0.989). Our findings suggest older adults with clinically relevant depressive symptoms derive similar benefits from participating in a comprehensive physical activity intervention in terms of reduced risk of mobility disability. These results support the inclusion of older adults with depressive symptoms in behavior-based clinical trials.

Bouts of exercise have a substantial affective influence, which can impact performance and adherence through training programs. Yet, both the level of effort exertion and affective state during exercise are hard to monitor without the use of questionnaires, which suffer from certain limitations. Here, we examined whether prosodic features, prominent characteristics of human expression, reflect the effort level and its related affect during bouts of exercise. We extracted prosodic features from verbal affective valence ratings recorded in a previously published study (n = 20; 10 women; n_obs = 2428) of resistance exercises performed by trained participants until task failure. We found that the mean and SD of the pitch predicted effort-related affective valence and proximity to task failure in the two subsets of the data, and in three separate bouts of exercise. These results imply that mean pitch elevation and the decrease of the SD of the pitch during effort exertion may serve as a signal of distress as task difficulty increases. The consistency of the findings across different exercises suggests that the mean and the SD of the pitch may be used to monitor physical effort and affect in various settings and help uncover the nature of physical effort in its different manifestations.

Mental health problems are prevalent in adolescence, but sports participation may offer mental health benefits through this developmental period and beyond. Characteristics of sports participation including perceived frequency and competence may differentially predict adolescent depressive, anxious, and somatic symptoms over time and results may further vary according to gender, neighborhood context, and type of sport engagement. Data were collected at two time-points six months apart from an ethnically diverse sample of adolescents (N = 183, female = 51%). Youth sports participation and symptoms were measured using the Youth Self-Report (YSR; Achenbach & Rescorla, 2001). Path analyses were used to test for main and moderating effects of sports on symptoms. Results showed that categorical sports participation did not prospectively predict any type of internalizing symptoms, but perceived frequency and competence did. Competence predicted lower levels of symptoms while frequency predicted higher levels of symptoms. These results were further moderated by gender, neighborhood, and sport type such that frequency and competence predicted symptoms for girls and for youth in more resourced neighborhoods and who participated in team sports. These findings highlight the impact that sports participation can have on adolescent mental health in an ethnically diverse sample of urban youth.

Excessive adolescent sedentary behaviors (SBs) may affect cognitive-academic achievements; however, findings vary according to the SB evaluated and their mental requirements. This study aimed to understand the multivariate association between different SBs and diverse cognitive-academic achievements as a primary analysis. As a secondary one, we differentiated between mentally active and inactive SBs. In this study, 1296 Chilean adolescents (10–14 years old) reported their SB via questionnaires. Cognitive performance was assessed with a neurocognitive battery, and academic achievement was based on school grades. Canonical correlation analysis was performed to determine the mode of covariation (MofC) between two sets of variables. The first set accounted for eight SBs (five considered as “active mentally” and three as “inactive mentally”). The second set accounted for 13 cognitive and academic variables (eight cognitive tasks and five school subjects). Several covariates and a cluster (schools, k = 19) were also included in the analysis. The primary analysis revealed a single significant MofC, with a small canonical relationship (r = 0.22, p = 0.002). This MofC indicated that time spent using computers and engaging in scholarly tasks at home was positively correlated with cognitive processing speed as well as with academic scores in English and History. Secondary analysis revealed two significant modes of covariation. The first confirmed the primary result (r = 0.21, p = 0.001), while the second highlighted the role of time spent playing video games as the sole contributing factor linked to inhibitory control (r = 0.17, p = 0.034). These findings indicate a small positive relationship between certain mentally active SBs and cognitive-academic achievements, emphasizing the need for further comprehensive research to understand these complex relationships.

Mental wellbeing is an important protective factor for health. This study aimed to investigate the domain-specific associations for physical activity and sedentary behaviours with different levels of mental wellbeing. We pooled data from the nationally representative 2012–2019 Scottish Health Surveys (31,818 adults (≥16 years); 52.3% female). Respondents reported domain-specific physical activity over the previous four weeks and average domain-specific daily sitting time for week and weekend days. Mental wellbeing was assessed using the Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale. Associations were investigated using cubic spline and multinomial regressions progressively adjusted for demographic variables, body mass index, self-reported general health, and other movement behaviours. The majority of the sample (71.2%) had a medium mental wellbeing score with 15.2% and 13.5% in the low and high categories respectively. The findings indicated that home-based heavy manual (including gardening and DIY), walking, sport and exercise, and leisure time sitting were all positively associated with mental wellbeing. There was no association evident for heavy housework or occupational sitting, and high levels of TV/screen time sitting were negatively associated with mental wellbeing. Activity at work presented a mixed picture. For walking and sport and exercise, the relationship differed by mental wellbeing level. The findings of this large population level study extend the argument that domains and types of activity matter, and not all physical activity and sedentary behaviour is equal in terms of mental wellbeing. Additionally, the relationship between some activity and mental wellbeing can vary depending on levels of mental wellbeing.