The findings of a study published with Frontiers suggests that those who
engage in regular exercise may lower their risk of developing anxiety by
almost 60%. Using data on almost 400,000 people spanning more than two
decades, the authors from Lund University in Sweden were also able to
identify a noticeable difference in exercise performance level and the risk
of developing anxiety between males and females.
A quick online search for ways to improve our mental health will often come
up with a myriad of different results. However, one of the most common
suggestions put forward as a step to achieving wellness – and preventing
future issues – is doing some physical exercise, whether it be a walk or
playing a team sport.
Anxiety disorders – which typically develop early in a person’s life – are
estimated to affect approximately 10% of the world’s population and have
been found to be twice as common in women compared to men.
And while exercise is put forward as a promising strategy for the treatment
of anxiety, little is known about the impact of exercise dose, intensity or
physical fitness level on the risk of developing anxiety disorders.
To help answer this question, researchers in Sweden recently published a
study in Frontiers in Psychiatry to show that those who took part in the
world’s largest long-distance cross-country ski race (Vasaloppet) between
1989 and 2010 had a “significantly lower risk” of developing anxiety
compared to non-skiers during the same period.
The study is based on data from almost 400,000 people in one of the largest
ever population-wide epidemiology studies across both sexes.
Surprising finding among female skiers
“We found that the group with a more physically active lifestyle had an
almost 60% lower risk of developing anxiety disorders over a follow-up
period of up to 21 years,” said first author of the paper, Martine Svensson,
and her colleague and principal investigator, Tomas Deierborg, of the
Department of Experimental Medical Science at Lund University, Sweden.
“This association between a physically active lifestyle and a lower risk of
anxiety was seen in both men and women.”
However, the authors found a noticeable difference in exercise performance
level and the risk of developing anxiety between male and female skiers.
While a male skier’s physical performance did not appear to affect the risk
of developing anxiety, the highest performing group of female skiers had
almost the double risk of developing anxiety disorders compared to the group
which was physically active at a lower performance level.
“Importantly,” they said, “the total risk of getting anxiety among
high-performing women was still lower compared to the more physically
inactive women in the general population”.
These findings cover relatively uncharted territory for scientific research,
according to the researchers, as most previous studies focused on depression
or mental illness as opposed to specifically diagnosed anxiety disorders.
Furthermore, some of the largest studies looking at this topic only included
men, were much smaller in sample size, and had either limited or no
follow-up data to track the long-term effects of physical activity on mental
health.
Next steps for research
The surprising discovery of an association between physical performance and
the risk for anxiety disorders in women also emphasized the scientific
importance of these findings for follow-up research.
“Our results suggest that the relation between symptoms of anxiety and
exercise behavior may not be linear,” Svensson said.
“Exercise behaviors and anxiety symptoms are likely to be affected by
genetics, psychological factors, and personality traits, confounders that
were not possible to investigate in our cohort. Studies investigating the
driving factors behind these differences between men and women when it comes
to extreme exercise behaviors and how it affects the development of anxiety
are needed.”
They added that randomized intervention trials, as well as long-term
objective measurements of physical activity in prospective studies, are also
needed to assess the validity and causality of the association they
reported.
But does this mean that skiing in particular can play an important role in
keeping anxiety at bay, as opposed to any other form of exercise? Not so,
Svensson and Deierborg said, given that previous studies have also shown the
benefits of keeping fit on our mental health.
“We think this cohort of cross-country skiers is a good proxy for an active
lifestyle, but there could also be a component of being more outdoors among
skiers,” they said.
“Studies focusing on specific sports may find slightly different results and
magnitudes of the associations, but this is most likely due to other
important factors that affect mental health and which you cannot easily
control in research analysis.”
Reference:
Physical Activity Is Associated With Lower Long-Term Incidence of Anxiety in
a Population-Based, Large-Scale Study by Martina Svensson, Lena Brundin,
Sophie Erhardt, Ulf Hållmarker, Stefan James and Tomas Deierborg, 10
September 2021, Frontiers in Psychiatry.
DOI: 10.3389/fpsyt.2021.714014
Tags:
Biology & Health