There's an Activity That Improves Mood With Lasting Effect in People With Depression

Exercise can be a serious mood booster for people with major depression. An hour of physical activity a week can reduce the risk of future episodes.

Surprisingly, little is known about the effects of exercise on mood and mind in people with depression, both during an exercise session and immediately after.

A lot of previous research on the effects of exercise on mental health have used broad measures of wellbeing, according to Iowa State University kinesiologist Jacob Meyer.

What we were interested in was how acute exercise affects the symptoms of depression.

A variety of mental changes make chronic forms of depression more than just a feeling of depression. There is a loss of enjoyment and pleasure that comes with depression.

The disorder has a relationship with impaired cognitive functions, including memory loss and processing speed, which may benefit from exercise.

Meyer and colleagues analyzed the test scores of 30 volunteers before, during, and after either a moderately intense half-hour cycling session, or a session of quiet rest.

A scale to measure anhedonia, a Stroop color and word test, and a questionnaire to evaluate current mood and feelings were included in the tests.

The evaluations were intended to give a better idea of how a person&s mental state changes during an exercise session.

Participants generally experienced an improvement in their mood, one that lasted for at least 75 minutes after the workout had ended.

75 minutes after a workout, feelings of anhedonia were starting to return. It was still a positive result compared to those who had quietly rested.

The variations in cognitive ability were surprising. The results among this sample were mixed, in contrast to previous findings on healthy individuals, which predicted improved reaction times.

The test results were slightly faster during exercise. This dropped 25 and 50 minutes after they stopped exercising.

It is not known why this might be the case, or if it is linked with other major depression symptoms.

It helps build a case for people with depression if there is an immediate improvement to mood and enjoyment after physical activity.

It might not be that simple. Depression depletes motivation, meaning even anticipation of the buzz that comes with getting out of the house and moving might not be enough to drive a change in habit.

For those who do manage to take the critical step, knowing that there is a window of at least an hour where the dark cloud lifts could help plan out the day a bit better.

The benefits to depressed mood state and anhedonia could last beyond 75 minutes.

We would need to do a longer study to determine when they start to wane, but the results suggest a window of time post-exercise when it may be easier or more effective for someone with depression to do something.

The research was published in the journal Psychology of Sport and Exercise.