Exercise and Anxiety

Exercise reorganizes the brain to reduce stress and anxiety

July 5, 2013

A research team based at Princeton University found that physical activity reorganizes the brain so that its response to stress is reduced and anxiety is less likely to interfere with normal brain function. Running produced a large increase in the number of new neurons in the hippocampus — a brain region shown to regulate anxiety — of a mouse that ran for six weeks (above). The brown cells are new neurons, which are more numerous in active mice than sedentary mice, and the blue cells are mature neurons. (Credit: Gould laboratory)

Physical activity reorganizes the brain so that its response to stress is reduced and anxiety is less likely to interfere with normal brain function, according to aPrinceton University research team.

The researchers report in the Journal of Neurosciencethat when mice allowed to exercise regularly experienced a stressor — exposure to cold water — their brains exhibited a spike in the activity of neurons that shut off excitement in the ventral hippocampus, a brain region shown to regulate anxiety.

The impact of physical activity on the ventral hippocampus specifically has not been deeply explored, said senior author Elizabeth Gould, Princeton’s Dorman T. Warren Professor of Psychology. By doing so, members of Gould’s laboratory pinpointed brain cells and regions important to anxiety regulation that may help scientists better understand and treat human anxiety disorders, she said./.../