COVID-19 Quarantine Impact on Wellbeing and Cognitive Functioning During a 10-Week High-Intensity Functional Training Program in Young University Students

Abstract

Physical exercise can improve cognitive functioning and wellbeing; however, the degree of change in either of these two variables seems to be related to the exercise intensity or type. Therefore, new physical training (PT) programs have been developed to increase exercise efficiency. One such example is high-intensity functional training (HIFT), which has proven to be a time-efficient and highly effective strategy to improve physical fitness. This study analyzed whether HIFT can affect reaction time (RT) and vitality, as well as positive and negative affect. Forty-two college students participated in the study, 21 in the experimental group and 21 in the control group. The experimental group completed 10 weeks of training, five of which were supervised, and the remainder consisted of online training during the COVID-19 quarantine. Participants were evaluated at the beginning, at the end of the 5 weeks of supervised training, and after the 5 weeks of online training. HIFT improved RT without changes in psychological wellbeing during the entire period of training supervised and online. Therefore, during the HIFT program, the quarantine situation did not adversely affect this population’s wellbeing, but it did negatively affect adherence to the training program.

Alexa, let's train now! — A systematic review and classification approach to digital and home-based physical training interventions aiming to support healthy cognitive aging

“…In this systematic review, we recognized 3 types of digital and home-based interventions: (a) digital databases, which were used in 7 studies; 191 , 192 , 193 , 194 , 195 , 196 , 197 (b) online classes, which were used in 4 studies; 76 , 85 , 198 , 199 and (c) technology-based exercise devices (e.g., exergames), which were used in 15 studies 200 , 201 , 202 , 203 , 204 , 205 , 206 , 207 , 208 , 209 , 210 , 211 , 212 , 213 , 214 (see the Methods section for definitions and Fig. 1 for an overview).…”

“…One study used both a digital database and online classes to deliver the physical intervention. 75 The reviewed studies investigated the effects of digital and home-based physical training interventions on cognitive performance in younger adults, 76 , 85 , 198 adults with multiple sclerosis, 204 , 207 adults with Parkinson's disease, 205 , 208 , 209 , 212 adults with cardiovascular diseases, 210 adults suffering from stroke, 213 healthy older adults, 192 , 193 , 194 , 195 , 196 , 197 , 200 , 201 , 202 , 203 , 211 older adults with mild cognitive impairment, 75 , 191 , 199 older adults with mild Alzheimer's disease, 206 and older adults with dementia. 214 A more detailed overview of the general characteristics of the participants is provided in Supplementary Table 1 .…”

“…All studies except for 1 study 198 were conducted in a parallel-group design and had either a passive control group, 76 , 85 , 191 , 192 , 193 , 194 , 200 , 201 , 202 , 203 , 204 , 209 , 211 an active control group, 75 , 195 , 196 , 197 , 199 , 206 , 207 , 208 , 212 , 213 , 214 or both. 193 , 210 Furthermore, the majority of studies provided general supervision, meaning that physical exercise sessions were unsupervised but participants were regularly contacted by the healthcare professionals (i.e., the research team) and/or could contact the healthcare professional when they needed assistance.…”

“…2 , 8258 studies were identified from the databases and 17 were retrieved from other sources. Eleven studies were retrieved from websites (e.g., platforms such as ResearchGate), 75 , 76 , 77 , 78 , 79 , 80 , 81 , 82 , 83 , 84 , 85 and 6 more were retrieved via a search for further publications by specific authors. 51 , 86 , 87 , 88 , 89 , 90

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Music listening as an emotion regulation strategy of students during COVID-19 lockdown

“…A substantial number of recent studies have aimed to examine university-students' well-being as related to the pandemic specific circumstances (e.g., Ballester-Ferrer et al, 2022;Krautter et al, 2022;Plakhotnik et al, 2021). In this context, there is additional data to support negative impact of COVID-19 pandemic on students' mental health and affect.…”