These are the findings of research by scientists at the Brain Mind and Behavior Research Center of the University of Granada and the Catholic University of Valencia
Their research-published in PlosOne-involved 75 male and female adolescents, half of them footballers belonging to the Levante UD club
Regular football (soccer) participation during adolescence is positively related with aerobic physical condition and the capacity to maintain sustained attention, according to a study conducted by scientists from the Catholic University of Valencia and the Brain Mind and Behavior Research Center of the University of Granada (CIMCYC).
Published recently in PlosOne, the study involved 75 male and female adolescents, half of whom were footballers belonging to the Levante UD club. The other half were students at a local public primary school (El Moli de Torrent, Valencia) and non-footballers.
All participants took a test to determine their aerobic physical condition as well as different questionnaires. They also performed an attention task specially designed to assess vigilance performance or sustained attention.
The results showed that the footballers who participated were in better aerobic physical condition than the non-footballers. “Moreover, the footballers showed better reaction times in the vigilance performance task, which indicates a better ability to focus their attention longer”, explains Daniel Sanabria, CIMCYC researcher and one of the authors of the study.
Cardiovascular fitness
Another important result was the lack of a significant correlation between cardiovascular fitness and reaction times in the cognitive task. “This last finding is contrary to the general idea that sport participation acts on attention through cardiovascular improvement, as some researchers suggest”, says Sanabria.
The authors indicate other factors that could explain the differences in level of attention, such as the better motor-perceptive skills in the footballers than in the non-athletes. “However, we must make it clear that further research is needed to probe deeper into the relationship between sport participation and attention, as well as to clearly establish the more important factors involved in this relationship”, adds Sanabria.
The study, entitled, “The relationship between regular sports participation and vigilance in male and female adolescents”, has been conducted by Rafael Ballester, Florentino Huertas, Francisco Yuste, Francesc Llorens and Daniel Sanabria.
According to earlier research, among the numerous benefits derived from regular sport participation, one that stands out is the improvement in vagal tone (more efficient functioning of the autonomous nervous system; greater heart rate variability). This even seems to be related with structural and functional adaptations of the central nervous system (for example, sport prevents neurodegeneration, promotes neurogenesis and the growth of capillary blood vessels in zones such as the hippocampus, cortex, cerebellum and basal ganglia).
Reference:
Ballester, R., Huertas, F., Yuste, F. J., Llorens, F., & Sanabria, D. (2015). The Relationship between Regular Sports Participation and Vigilance in Male and Female Adolescents.
(4), e0123898. http://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0123898
Image: Adolescents playing football (PHOTO: PIXABAY).
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Contact details:
Daniel Sanabria
Department of Experimental Psychology University of Granada
Phone: +34 958 246 240
E-mail address: daniel@ugr.es
