Sports Makes Your Brain Work Faster
Reasons for sports being a “mind enhancer”.
We all know how enormously positive influence has sports on the prevention of the disease, such as stroke, heart attack or diabetes. It is connected with lowering the blood pressure and keeping the blood circulation in the proper state.
There are also other benefits, more difficult to detect, such as the intellectual benefits of sports. One of the studies done at British Columbia University concluded that aerobic exercises improve memory function by making our hippocampus (the region of the brain involved in the consolidation of short-term memory or spatial memory) bigger.
“Notably, we observed a 5.6% volume increase in the left hippocampus, a 2.5% increase in the right hippocampus, and a 4% increase in total hippocampus”.
Furthermore, regular exercise can make us less prone to developing Alzheimer’s disease according to the study in Nature. Our neurons are better saved if we are continuously doing sports exercises.
Apart from the hippocampus, also other parts of the brain increase their volume because of sports exercises. A great number of research articles directly points out that the greatest beneficiary, apart from the hippocampus are the prefrontal cortex and caudate nucleus. The first one is involved in the majority of our most intelligent tasks and the latter one is responsible for the initiation of most of the motor activities. The caudate nucleus has been also connected with Parkinson’s disease. Therefore, sports exercise can prevent both Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s.
Our brain can be constantly reprogrammed in terms of neuronal connections. The definition of brain plasticity is that it is the ability of neural networks in the brain to change through growth and reorganization. Doing sports adds up to this process. Thanks to exercises, neurons are stimulated to develop more synaptic connections. People who regularly perform aerobic exercise (for instance running, jogging, brisk walking, swimming, and cycling) have greater scores on neuropsychological function and performance tests that measure certain cognitive functions, such as attentional control, inhibitory control, and information processing speed.
What is more, sports reduces stress levels. Nowadays, there are a lot of stress inducers that negatively influences our brain. The consequence of stress is that it kills our neurons through a variety of mechanisms. It is often observed within the group of active marathoners that they have rather a positive attitude towards life and generally their mood tends to be positive. Scientists also describe sports activities as antidepressants.
Last but not least, athletes proved that because of their profession they tend to be more efficient in focus. It is connected with the prefrontal cortex, previously mentioned, which allows them to be fully focused on the task.
…
Therefore, if we want to have bigger brain regions, such as the hippocampus or prefrontal cortex it is definitely suggested to do sports. Even shorts breaks, 15-minutes between hard and desk work can improve substantially our intellect and overall health outcomes. This is so essential topic that there is a Wikipedia post created about called “Neurobiological effects of physical exercise”.
