Breaking up prolonged sitting with moderate-intensity walking improves attention and executive function in Qatari females

Cultural, environmental and logistical factors promote a sedentary lifestyle within Qatar, particularly for females. Sedentary behaviour is acutely associated with poor cognitive function and fatigue, and chronically may be implicated with cognitive decline (i.e. Alzheimer's disease). To examin...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2019-07, Vol.14 (7), p.e0219565
Main Authors: Chrismas, Bryna C R, Taylor, Lee, Cherif, Anissa, Sayegh, Suzan, Bailey, Daniel P
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Alzheimer's disease
Analysis
Attention
Biology and Life Sciences
Blood Glucose
Breakup
Cognition
Cognition Disorders - prevention & control
Cognitive ability
COMPASS (programming language)
Crossovers
Data processing
Energy Metabolism
Executive Function
Exercise
Fatigue
Female
Females
Fitness equipment
Humans
Information processing
Laboratories
Long-term effects
Medicine
Medicine and Health Sciences
Mental performance
Neuropsychological Tests
Neurosciences
Nutrients
People and Places
Performance assessment
Physical fitness
Psychopharmacology
Qatar
Reaction time
Reaction time task
Sedentary Behavior
Sitting Position
Social Sciences
Sport science
Sports medicine
Treadmills
Visual stimuli
Walking
Young Adult
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Summary:Cultural, environmental and logistical factors promote a sedentary lifestyle within Qatar, particularly for females. Sedentary behaviour is acutely associated with poor cognitive function and fatigue, and chronically may be implicated with cognitive decline (i.e. Alzheimer's disease). To examine the effects of breaking up sitting with short-duration frequent walking bouts on cognitive function and fatigue in Qatari females. Eleven sedentary (sitting ≥7 h/day) females completed three visits; the first being familiarisation. In a cross-over randomised manner, experimental visits two and three were identical, except participants either remained seated for 5-h (SIT) or interrupted their sitting every 30-min with a 3-min moderate-intensity walk (WALK) on a motorised treadmill. The Computerised Mental Performance Assessment System (COMPASS) assessed cognition at baseline (-15-min), and then at 2.5-h and 5-h into the experimental conditions. Specific COMPASS tasks employed were; serial-3 subtractions (2-min), serial-7 subtractions (2-min), simple reaction time (RT; 50 stimuli), rapid visual information processing [RVIP (5-min)], choice reaction time (CRT; 50 stimuli), and Stroop (60 stimuli); and a visual analogue scale for fatigue (VAS-F) was completed at the same time intervals. There was a significant condition effect for CRT (f = 26.7, p = 0.007). On average CRT was 101 s (95% CI = -47 to -156 s) quicker in WALK compared to SIT. There was a significant time effect for CRT (f = 15.5, p = 0.01). On average CRT was 134 s slower at 5-h compared to baseline (p = 0.006; 95% CI = -64 to -203 s), and 114 s slower at 5-h compared to 2.5-h (p = 0.01; 95% CI = -44 to -183 s). There was a significant interaction effect for RT in the Stroop incongruent task (f = 10.0, p = 0.03). On average RT was 210 s quicker at 2.5-h in WALK compared to SIT (p = 0.01; 95% CI = -76 to -346 s). Breaking up prolonged sitting with moderate-intensity walking offers an ecologically valid intervention to enhance some aspects of cognitive function, whilst not affecting fatigue in sedentary Qatari females. Whilst these findings are promising, the long-term effects of breaking up sitting on cognitive function requires testing before population level recommendations can be made.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0219565