Exercise can boost your memory and thinking skills, says neurologist Scott McGinnis in a press release published by Harvard Medical School, where he works. David Jacobs, a professor of epidemiology and community health at the University of Minnesota, agrees: “For generally healthy people, exercising regularly can enhance brain function over a lifetime — not just after a workout,” he writes in an article published by Scientific American. The list of researchers and health advocates who take the cognitive benefits of physical exercise for granted is long, and numerous studies appear to support this widely held belief.
But a few days ago, Dr. Daniel Sanabria Lucena (Bordeaux, France, 46 years old), a professor at the University of Granada and a researcher with the Mind, Brain and Behavior Center, published a review in the journal Nature Human Behaviorthat calls this belief into question. Sanabria’s team analyzed 109 studies, involving over 11,000 participants, that found exercise to have a positive effect on cognitive ability. The team discovered various problems with the studies’ methodologies, leading them to conclude that there is no difinitive evidence to support the claim that physical activity has a positive effect on brain performance.