Effects of acute exercise of different modalities and durations on interference control and response inhibition in healthy young adults.

This study examined the immediate and sustained effects of acute exercise modalities and durations on inhibitory control including response inhibition and interference control. Fifty-nine young adults participated in three exercise interventions and a reading intervention. Three exercise interventions consisted of a 20-min moderate intensity continuous exercise (MICE), a 20-min high intensity interval exercise (HIIE) and a 10-min HIIE. Using a colour-word Stroop task and a Go/no-go task, interference control and response inhibition were assessed before the intervention (t₀), immediately after the intervention (t₁), and then at 30 min (t₂) and 60 min (t₃) after the intervention. During the Stroop task, the response time (RT) was significantly shorter for both congruent and incongruent trials immediately after 20-min HIIE compared to that before exercise, and this reduction lasted for 60 min. The improvement in the Stroop task can be maintained for 30 min after 20-min MICE. In addition, the 10-min HIIE intervention immediately reduced the RT of the incongruent trials. However, the Go/no-go results showed no significant change in task performance after the four interventions. The above findings suggest that when compared to MICE for the same exercise time, improvements in interference control were sustained longer and better following 20-min HIIE. In addition, HIIE for 20-min rather than shorter duration was best for both basic information processing and interference control performance. A duration of 20-min HIIE may be a more effective way to improve interference control. Neither HIIE nor MICE had any effect on response inhibition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]