Executive function and self-regulated exergaming adherence among older adults

Abstract

The rise in dementia and the evidence of cognitive benefits of exercise for the older adult population together make salient the research into variables affecting cognitive benefit and exercise behavior. One promising avenue for increasing exercise participation has been the introduction of exergaming, a type of exercise that works in combination with virtual reality to enhance both the exercise experience and health outcomes. Past research has revealed that executive function (EF) was related to greater use of self-regulatory strategies, which in turn was related to greater adherence to exercise following an intervention (McAuley et al., 2011). Best et al. (2014) found improvement in EF related to adherence to exercise post- intervention. Anderson-Hanley et al. (2012) found that for older adults aerobic exergaming yielded greater cognitive benefit than traditional exercise alone; however, questions remain as to the possible impact of greater cognitive benefit and other factors on participants’ involvement in exercise following the end of an intervention. The current study presents follow-up data exploring the relationship between EF, self-regulation, and exercise behavior in the post-intervention (naturalistic) period. Herein, it was predicted that higher EF at the start of the naturalistic window, would predict subsequent exercise with an exergame. Contrary to expectations, results suggest that those with poorer EF are likely to exergame more frequently. The results of this study contradict previous literature, but suggest an interesting relationship between EF, self-regulation, and exercise behaviors when exergaming is employed, particularly with older adults with some cognitive decline. We hypothesize that other factors may be at work, perhaps expectation of cognitive benefit might act as a unique motivator.

The Aerobic and Cognitive Exercise Study (ACES) for Community-Dwelling Older Adults With or At-Risk for Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI): Neuropsychological, Neurobiological and Neuroimaging Outcomes of a Randomized Clinical Trial

“…To provide an additional point of comparison of the relative effect of physical exercise alone vs. interactively combined with mental exercise, archival data was culled from our prior Cybercycle Study. In that study, 33 participants were randomly assigned to a traditional exercise or “pedal-only” condition in which participants pedaled a stationary bike (in many cases the same model as used in the present study), but without the virtual reality display (see below for between group comparisons at baseline; for additional details see Anderson-Hanley et al, 2012 , 2014 ; Dimitrova et al, 2016 ).…”

Affective and Attentional States When Running in a Virtual Reality Environment

“…The remaining studies did include some form of control condition. The typical control condition required that participants engage in the sport or exercise without any external stimulus being present (e.g., [ 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 ]). These manipulations have been referred to as a “blank environment” [ 13 ].…”

A Scoping Review of Augmented/Virtual Reality Health and Wellbeing Interventions for Older Adults: Redefining Immersive Virtual Reality

“…Instead, 13 additional theories were used to support the AR/VR methodologies used in those papers (See Table 6) and only the theory of planned behavior (Anderson-Hanley et al, 2012;Merriman et al, 2018) was cited twice. Overall, the theories that were cited focused on either the impact of the surrounding environment (Anderson-Hanley et al, 2011;Felnhofer et al, 2014;Glännfjord et al, 2017) , the intrinsic motivations of the individual (Anderson-Hanley et al, 2011;Kahlbaugh et al, 2011;Anderson-Hanley et al, 2014;Glännfjord et al, 2017;De Vries et al, 2018) or the complex cognitive processes occurring in the unconscious (Fasilis et al, 2018;Lokka et al, 2018;Merriman et al, 2018).…”