ANXIETY AND HEART-RATE UNDER PSYCHOLOGICAL STRESS - THE EFFECTS OF EXERCISE-TRAINING

The effects of a 12-week exercise-training program on cognitive, somat ic, and behavioral anxiety and on heart rate responses to evaluative s tress were scrutinized in 89 subjects randomly assigned to an experime ntal (exercise) or a control group. The training program consisted of exercises that were aimed to the improvement of the general physical f itness (i.e., strength, flexibility, and endurance). Following the 12- week training period, exercising subjects showed improved motor skill capacity as well as higher VO2 max. In an anxiety inciting test situat ion, that consisted of the video-taped delivery of a 5-min speech, a m ental arithmetic and a fine motor task, exercising subjects showed mor e favourable responses than control subjects in three ways: (a) they e xhibited lower behavioral anxiety during the anticipation phase of the three stressors, (b) they reported lower cognitive and somatic anxiet y during the anxiety provoking situation, and (c) their heart rate rec overed faster, in contrast to both their baseline heart rate and the c ontrol subjects' heart rate, from the stress episode. These results de monstrate that a fitness-oriented exercise program has anxiolytic prop erties. They also provide a primary evidence that overt behavioral anx iety, as opposed to the usually measured self-reported anxiety, may be affected by exercise.