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How Exercise Is Improved By Executing Aerobic Exercise

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Exercise has been associated with many different kinds of positive effects in individuals. For example, physical and mental disorders occur less in individuals who exercise (Hillman, Erickson, & Kramer, 2008). A more recent idea is that exercise is associated with increased cognitive performance (Hogan, Mata, & Carstensen, 2013). Different aspects of exercise and memory have been studied. One study showed that running had a positive effect on vocabulary learning (Griffin, Mullally, Foley, Warmington, O 'Mara, & Kelly, 2011). Another illustrated how working memory is improved by executing aerobic exercise (Quelhas Martins , Kavussanu , Willoughby , & Ring , 2013). Cognitive performance on the Stroop test was also increased following a high …show more content…

The altered brain activity in children who exercise could be a prime example of how the difference in brain activity after exercising could improve memory consolidation.
The current view on memory formation is that there is first a learning phase, an intermediate phase, and then consolidation of the information, which results in long-term memory (Snigdha, Rivera, Milgram, & Cotman, 2014). If exercise has been proven to improve performance at the first two phases, then consolidation of the information should be improved as well. A recent study determined the effects of aerobic exercise and memory consolidation in canines. The results showed that there was enhanced consolidation in the canines that exercised prior to performing the different memory tasks (Snigdha, 2014). Although this experiment was done with canines, it is one of the few that has directly associated memory consolidation and exercise. The improved performance in consolidation of canines could very well have the same outcome in humans too. One issue that could be troubling while studying effects of exercise and memory is determining whether it is state dependent or not. Since the brain is aroused while learning the new information after exercising, the information could be better retrieved following exercise as well. It is important to determine whether or not it is state dependent. The assumption is that memory is consolidated much better when exercise is performed prior to

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