Response inhibition and exercise: from theory to translational practice.
Daisuke Sato
PMID 41858319WHAT IT FOUND
Long-term sport experience and acute aerobic exercise appear to improve reactive stopping, the ability to cancel an action on a sudden signal.
Proactive inhibition, the ability to prepare to stop, shows inconsistent changes. Evidence for clinical translation remains theoretical.
Key findings
01Meta-analytic evidence indicates athletes have shorter stop-signal reaction times than non-athletes, an estimated mean difference of approximately 17 ms.
02Acute moderate-to-vigorous aerobic exercise can temporarily improve reactive stopping, with benefits persisting for tens of minutes after the bout.
03Effects on proactive inhibition are dose- and timing-dependent; high intensity can impair performance, and moderate exercise may shift neural markers without improving behavioural accuracy.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they found
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What it does not show
This is a narrative review, not a systematic review or meta-analysis, so the selection of studies and synthesis is not reproducible or exhaustive. Most evidence is drawn from healthy athletes and laboratory tasks, not clinical populations receiving therapy. The review notes that findings for proactive inhibition depend heavily on task implementation and measurement choice, making generalisation difficult. There is no direct evidence presented that these laboratory findings translate to functional improvements in daily life or clinical outcomes for patients.
Declared interests
The authors declare financial support from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Kakenhi (Grant numbers: 21H03310 and 24K02847).
The easy way to misread this
Do not interpret these findings as evidence that exercise improves functional inhibition in clinical patients. The review synthesises laboratory data from athletes and healthy adults, and the authors explicitly state that translational implications are currently theoretical hypotheses rather than tested clinical interventions.
Summarised by AI from the full paper, without a clinician reviewing it. Check it against the source before it changes what you do. Read it on PubMed →