Why Exercise Makes You Less Anxious
well.blogs.nytimes.com
Why Exercise Makes You Less Anxious
1–10 of 27 posts
Re: Why Exercise Makes You Less Anxious
#2Would driving a race car or something like that for 20 minutes a day give some of the same benefits as actually exercising?
I have this theory that anxiety and depression are most commonly caused by sensory deprivation, which is obviously counter-intuitive, but it seems to match with both the clinical data and also with anecdotal evidence about how people self-medicate.
Re: Why Exercise Makes You Less Anxious
#3I always assumed that this was because my brain is part of my body, and doing stuff that is good for my body would be the same stuff that is good for my brain.
For some reason we draw this weird metaphysical distinction between the brain and the other organs in the body that make results like this seem strange, when they clearly are not.
The idea that healthy people think better should not shock us. (Think better in terms of lower incidence psychological problems, although i always feel smarter after I exercise as well...)
Re: Why Exercise Makes You Less Anxious
#4The problem is that there are some really fundamental differences between rats and humans in terms of metabolism. (E.g. things as different as that they have a type of muscle fibre, type IIb, that we do not have at all.)
You just can't take studies on rats like this and assume that they have any relevance to humans. There are many many known metabolic effects that work on rats but not on people.
Re: Why Exercise Makes You Less Anxious
#5Exercise does seem to steady my emotions, but that's not the greatest benefit I get from exercising. Health benefits aside, I can simply focus more. There's nothing like being able to sit down and fully comprehend the problem at hand because you went for a run earlier.
Re: Why Exercise Makes You Less Anxious
#6It seems like an odd test to me. Swimming in cold water would test fitness more than ability to handle stress. And since some rats did not exercise they became less fit and would not handle the cold water test as well. Am I missing something?
Re: Why Exercise Makes You Less Anxious
#7Would driving a race car or something like that for 20 minutes a day give some of the same benefits as actually exercising? I have this theory that anxiety and depression are most commonly caused by sensory deprivation, which is obviously counter-intuitive, but it seems to match with both the clinical data and also with anecdotal evidence about how people self-medicate.
Interesting idea! I wonder if that's why I always feel so much more awake and focused after taking a shower?
Re: Why Exercise Makes You Less Anxious
#8The problem is that there are some really fundamental differences between rats and humans in terms of metabolism. (E.g. things as different as that they have a type of muscle fibre, type IIb, that we do not have at all.) You just can't take studies on rats like this and assume that they have any relevance to humans. There are many many known metabolic effects that work on rats but not on people.
In human subjects, I would wonder if exercise outdoors in sunlight is more efficacious for reducing anxiety and stabilizing mood than exercise with indoor lighting. I also wonder if exercising with a friend is better than exercising alone for Homo sapiens. All I've got on this issue from personal experience are anecdotes,
http://norvig.com/experiment-design.html
but I would be interested to see if there are human-specific effects that wouldn't generalize back to other animals.
Re: Why Exercise Makes You Less Anxious
#9It seems like an odd test to me. Swimming in cold water would test fitness more than ability to handle stress. And since some rats did not exercise they became less fit and would not handle the cold water test as well. Am I missing something?
Yeah this is totally what I was thinking?!?!
Re: Why Exercise Makes You Less Anxious
#10Would driving a race car or something like that for 20 minutes a day give some of the same benefits as actually exercising? I have this theory that anxiety and depression are most commonly caused by sensory deprivation, which is obviously counter-intuitive, but it seems to match with both the clinical data and also with anecdotal evidence about how people self-medicate.
In terms of sensory deprivation tanks, Wikipedia says that it actually can relax you in the short term, and only causes anxiety after prolonged exposure (or lack thereof).