So say researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, who examined the effects of physical activity history on electrocortical indices of executive control in older adults. Kinesiology professor Charles Hillman presented the results of the study in a paper titled "Aging, Physical Activity and Executive Control Function" at the annual conference of the American College of Sports Medicine in St. Louis May 29-June 1. Co-authors with Hillman are kinesiology professor Edward McAuley and psychology professor Arthur Kramer, and graduate students Artem Belopolsky and Erin Snook.
In the study, the Illinois researchers employed a series of tests designed to measure cognitive responses of 32 people assigned to four categories: older adults who reported low, moderate, and high levels of physical activity in their day-to-day routines, along with a control group of college-age adults. The older adults had a median age of 66. Hillman said the study focused on the relationship between exercise and aging on "executive control function," or ECF, which he described as "cognitive processes which require more effort and are largely mediated by the (brain's) frontal lobes."
An example of a more simple cognitive process, he said, occurs when a driver stopped at a red light proceeds automatically as the light turns green. Greater amounts of ECF kick in when a driver starts to move forward, then slams on the brakes to avoid hitting an obstacle that suddenly appears in the intersection. "ECF requires a more conscious effort to negotiate the environment," Hillman said.
In the Illinois study, the measured responses to neuro-electric stimuli among people in the "high active older adults
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Contact: Melissa Mitchell
melissa@uiuc.edu
(217) 333-5491
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
31-May-2002