Aerobic exercise impacts the anterior cingulate cortex in adolescents with subthreshold mood syndromes: a randomized controlled trial study

Abstract

Aerobic exercise is effective in alleviating mood symptoms while the mechanism is poorly understood. There are limited clinical trials that investigated the effect of exercise on the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), a key brain region involved in mood regulations, in adolescents with subthreshold mood syndromes. This randomized controlled trial (RCT) of aerobic exercise was undertaken in a middle school in Guangzhou, China. Participants were adolescents aged 12–14 with subthreshold mood syndromes including depressive and manic symptoms and were randomly assigned to an aerobic exercise intervention or a psychoeducation control group. Participants in the exercise group received moderate-intensity exercise intervention, consisting of 30 mins running, 4 days per week for 3 months. The primary outcome in this study was structural changes in the ACC from baseline to post intervention. The trial was registered with ClinicalTrial.gov (NCT03300778). Of 56 participants who met the criteria for subthreshold mood syndromes, 39 (41.03% males) had complete MRI data, with 20 and 19 subjects in the exercise and control group, respectively. At baseline, demographic information (e.g., age and sex), clinical symptoms, and the gray matter volume and cortical thickness of ACC were matched between the two groups. After 12 weeks of treatment, participants in the exercise group displayed increased gray matter volume of the left rostral ACC (F1,30 = 5.73, p = 0.02) and increased cortical thickness of the right rostral ACC (F1,30 = 7.83, p = 0.01) when compared with the control group. No significant differences were found for caudal ACC cortical thickness and gray matter volume. Our data demonstrate that 12-week, moderate-intensity aerobic exercise can induce structural changes in the rostral ACC in adolescents with subthreshold mood syndromes.

Effects of Diversified Sports Activity Module on Physical Fitness and Mental Health of 4–5-Year-Old Preschoolers

“…Sports activity was conducive to improving interpersonal relationship (23). Aerobic activity could relieve anxiety and depression and promote psychological health (24). These findings conform to the conclusions of the study.…”

Active school travel is associated with fewer suicide attempts among adolescents from low-and middle-income countries

“…First, AST has been shown to negatively associate with depressive symptoms among adolescents ( Gu and Chen, 2020 , Sun et al, 2015 ), and there is evidence to suggest that the presence of depressive symptoms is an important predictor of attempted suicide. Collectively, AST may result in exercise-induced physiological changes ( Bell, Audrey, Gunnell, Cooper, & Campbell, 2019 , Dore et al, 2020 ) that are associated with improved emotion regulation ability that could alleviate depressive symptom, which in turn makes the odds for suicide attempts lower ( Andermo et al, 2020 , Lin et al, 2020 ; Vancampfort, Hallgren et al, 2018 ). Second, as a unique tenet of PA, AST is a multifaceted behavior interacting with social and environmental settings.…”

Physical Activity and Sports Participation in Irish Adolescents and Associations with Anxiety, Depression and Mental Wellbeing. Findings from the Physical Activity and Wellbeing (Paws) Study

“…Most recent evidence suggests a combination of physiological and psychosocial processes. Proposed physiological mechanisms, such as the monoamine hypothesis (exercise improves brain aminergic synaptic transmission, affecting monoamines such as noradrenaline, dopamine, BDNF, and serotonin, all of which have been implicated in depressive disorders) (Ransford, 1982;Chen, 2013); the endorphin hypothesis (endorphins are produced as a result of exercise, which help to reduce pain and induce a state of euphoria) (North & McCullagh, 1990;Morgan, 1985); and the anterior cingulate cortex hypothesis (which can be developed through a higher frequency of moderate exercise and is believed to lead to an increase in grey matter volume) (Lin et al, 2020;Lubans et al, 2016;Phillips & Swartz, 2014) cannot entirely account for physical activity induced changes in mental health. Meta-analytic evidence has shown a positive association between leisure-time physical activity and mental health.…”