I-PAC Study

Impact - Physical Activity on Cognition (I-PAC)

Attention is a cognitive process that describes the ability of an individual to consciously choose and focus on relevant stimuli. It is a subjective phenomenon, and various methods have been devised to objectively quantify it. The activities of an individual can have varying effects on their attention, and there is a need and desire to investigate these activities and their effects.

The aim of this study is to build a predictive model of the effect of physical exercise on cognitive short-term selective attention on university students, using EEG and other physiological biomarkers such as heart rate.

Call for Volunteers: Student may apply here

Proposed Study

This study will be limited to university students, since it is believed that they are most susceptible to distractions, and will find the results of this research to be of the greatest utility. They must be free of any contraindications to performing intense whole-body exercise (i.e. no pre-existing musculoskeletal injury and/or medical conditions). They must have not been diagnosed with ADHD or major depression.

They will be asked to not consume caffeine or alcohol, or engage in any exercise for 24 hours before the test. A consent form (See Appendix A) will be provided to them, to declare that their participation is voluntary.

At the site, they will be made to wear a neuroelectric skullcap for measuring EEG signals, and a Heart rate sensor for measuring non-EEG physiological signals. These devices will record participant data until the end of the protocol.

The protocol follows a pre-post test design. The hypothesis is that the impact of exercise will be evident from the differential of the pre and post exercise Stroop test.

The first phase is a relaxation phase of 10 minutes, to allow normalization of the participant’s mental and physical state. The second phase is a Stroop test [3][4]. This allows the participant to act as their own control, and accounts for day-to-day variability that may impact performance. The third phase is a relaxation phase of 5 minutes. The fourth phase is the exercise phase, and the routine is a modified Tabata design [2]. Participants are instructed to do these exercises as fast as possible, with the correct technique. Continual motivation and feedback is provided by the researcher through the sessions. The fifth phase is a relaxation phase of 10 minutes. The sixth and final phase is the post-exercise Stroop test. The protocol takes a total of 40 minutes to complete.

The protocol is listed pointwise for better readability:

1. 10 minutes rest

2. Stroop test [3][4]

3. 5 minutes rest

4. Exercise

   1. There are 4 exercises : Burpees, jumping jacks, mountain climbers, and squat jumps

   2. 4 sets per exercise

   3. 20 seconds per set

   4. 10 seconds intervals between sets

   5. 1 minute rest between exercises

5. 10 minutes rest

6. Stroop test

Call for Volunteers: Student may apply here:

References

[1] Moreau, D., and Chou, E. (2019). The acute effect of high-intensity exercise on executive function: a meta-analysis. Perspect. Psychol. Sci. 14, 734–764. doi: 10.1177/1745691619850568

[2] Walsh, Jeremy J.; Dunlap, Charlotte; Miranda, Jonathan; Thorp, David B.; Kimmerly, Derek S.; Tschakovsky, Michael; and Gurd, B J. (2018). Brief, High-Intensity Interval Exercise Improves Selective Attention in University Students, International Journal of Exercise Science: Vol. 11 : Iss. 5, 152 - 167.

[3] Stoet, G. (2010). PsyToolkit - A software package for programming psychological experiments using Linux. Behavior Research Methods, 42(4), 1096-1104.

[4] Stoet, G. (2017). PsyToolkit: A novel web-based method for running online questionnaires and reaction-time experiments. Teaching of Psychology, 44(1), 24-31.

[5] Joe Cutting & Paul Cairns (2020): Investigating game attention

using the Distraction Recognition Paradigm, Behaviour & Information Technology, DOI:

10.1080/0144929X.2020.1849402

[6] J. Hazarika, P. Kant, R. Dasgupta and S. H. Laskar (2018) "Neural modulation in action video game players during inhibitory control function: An EEG study using discrete wavelet transform", J Biomedical Signal Processing and Control, vol. 45, pp. 144-150, 2018.