Effects of acute resistance exercise on cognition in late middle-aged adults: General or specific cognitive improvement?

Abstract Objectives To evaluate the effect of acute resistance exercise on multiple cognitive measures in late middle-aged adults and to address the question of whether general or selective cognitive improvements occur. Design A counterbalanced repeated-measures experimental design. Methods Thirty adults (mean age = 58.1 ± 3.0 years) were administered five different Stroop test conditions before and after a single bout of resistance exercise and after a no-treatment control. The resistance exercise protocol involved two sets of seven exercises performed at 70% of a 10-repetition maximum, with 30 and 60 s between each set and each exercise, respectively. Results The exercise treatment resulted in significantly enhanced performance across all Stroop conditions when compared with the control ( p < .001). Furthermore, the effect of the exercise treatment on Stroop incongruent performance corresponded to the largest positive influence compared to the performance observed under the other four Stroop test conditions. Conclusions These findings extend the current knowledge base by demonstrating that acute resistance exercise facilitates general cognition but has a more beneficial effect on cognition that involves executive control.