Health factors affected by exercise

Emotion and mood

Physical activity and exercise have consistently been associated with positive mood and affect. A direct relation between physical activity and psychological well-being has been confirmed in several large-scale epidemiological surveys, including in the UK, by means of various measures of activity and well-being.

• Meta-analytic evidence shows that aerobic exercise leads to a small to moderate increase in vigour; a decrease of similar magnitude in tension, depression, fatigue, and confusion; and a small decrease in anger.
• Experimental trials support a positive effect for exercise of moderate intensity on psychological well-being (Biddle, in Biddle, Fox, & Boutcher, 2000).

Quality of life

• Higher levels of physical activity were associated with greater health-related quality of life among persons with diagnosed mental disorders. Quality of life was considered across eight dimensions: vitality, social functioning, mental health, role limitations related to emotional health, those related to physical health, bodily pain, physical function, and general health. Researchers (Schmitz et al., 2004) observed a spectrum of improvements and cautiously concluded that "physical activity can be beneficial for people suffering from mental disorders."
• High-intensity aerobic exercise has shown positive effects on the well-being of adolescents (Norris et al., 1992).

Self-esteem

• Exercise is a means to promote physical self-worth and other important physical self-perceptions, such as body image. In some situations this improvement is accompanied by improved self-esteem. Physical self-worth carries mental well-being properties in its own right and should be considered one of the valuable end-points of exercise programs.
• The positive effects of exercise on self-perceptions can be experienced by all age groups, but the strongest evidence for change has been established for children and middle-aged adults.
• Several types of exercise are effective in changing self-perceptions, but most of the supporting research evidence clusters around aerobic exercise and resistance training, with the latter showing greater effectiveness in the short term (Fox, in Biddle, Fox, & Boutcher, 2000).
• Exercise showed positive effects on self-esteem, self-concept and depressive symptoms in a nonclinical sample of 399 youth (Garcia et al., 1997).
• Surveyed adolescents who reported that they exercise had significantly higher self-reported levels of self-esteem (Modrcin-Talbott et al., 1998). As depression scores decreased, their self-esteem scores increased. Lower self-esteem in this group of adolescents correlated significantly with more depression, older age, and non-participation in exercise.
• In a study by Hilyer and colleagues (1982) of 60 youthful offenders, physical fitness training was noted to reduce depression and anxiety, elevate low self-esteem, and promote a generally healthier psychological state.
• Participation in a supervised exercise-therapy program improved measures of self-esteem among obese and morbidly obese adolescents over time (Daley et al., 2006).

Social activity/sense of mastery

• Effects of exercise programs included improved body image, feelings of mastery brought about by the completion of a physically demanding program, and a variety of group dynamic effects (Norris et al., 1992).
• Benefits of an exercise program may be attributable, in part, to the social support aspects of the program (Babyak et al., 2000).
• Because solitary exercise does not improve depression (Hughes et. al., 1986), it is critically important that exercise be accompanied by social activity.
• Exercise provides the psychological benefit of self-mastery and social integration (Salmon, 2001).
• "Mastery experiences and successes with physical activity can be meaningful in improving self-esteem, particularly in the developmental stage of adolescence" (Calfas & Taylor, 1994, p. 417).

Sleep

• Individuals who exercise regularly have a lower risk of disturbed sleep, but the causal relations are less well established. Regular exercise training may improve the sleep of persons with disturbed sleep patterns, although there is no clear consensus. Acute exercise elicits a modest improvement in sleep among good sleepers; this effect is greater for longer exercise durations. The influence of acute exercise on sleep is similar for fit and unfit people. Time of day or intensity of exercise have little moderating influence (Youngstedt & Freelove-Charton, in Faulkner & Taylor, 2005).

Cognitive functioning

• Most cross-sectional studies show that older adults who are fit display better cognitive performance than those who are less fit. The association between fitness and cognitive performance is task-dependent, with tasks that are rapid and demand attention (e.g., reaction-time tasks) having the most pronounced effects. Results of intervention studies are equivocal, but meta-analysis of their findings indicates a small but statistically significant improvement in cognitive functioning among older adults who increase their aerobic fitness (Boutcher, 2000).