How important is physical activity for people life? Daily new evidences are added responding this question and reinforcing the importance of the physical exercise practice. The benefits from an active life extend from a healthier cardiovascular system to a better emotional health (Agarwal, 2012; Stathopoulou, Powers, Berry, Smits, & Otto, 2006). Lastly, one of the benefits that have raised more interest amongst the science community is the role of the exercise on the improvement of cerebral processes.

It is known that regular physical activity, specially moderate to high intensity aerobic exercise, has the property to increase the human cognitive capacity through an enhancement of the cerebral structures, both in elderly as in adult and children (Guiney & Machado, 2013). In children, who are immersed in a constant learning and cognitively exigent process, is has been seen that those who presented a better physical fitness level had a faster cerebral impulse transmission speed and, at the same time, a better cognitive capacity associated to better academic performance (Scudder et al., 2014).

However, not only regular physical exercise practice has the potential to improve the cognitive capacity of individuals. During the last years, it has also been evidenced how a single session of moderate intensity aerobic exercise can contribute improving the cognitive performance (Chang & Etnier, 2009). Beyond this cognitive enhancement, it has been reported that when intensity is high enough aerobic exercise possesses the property to potentiate the learning capacity and long-term memory formation. In a recent study, Winter et al (2007) observed how participants who engaged in a single intense exercise session previous to the practice in a vocabulary learning task, improved their acquisition speed by 20%. Furthermore, the same participants retained more words 7 after first practice. Thou, exercise positively influence both the information encoding and the formation of long-term memory.

Recent studies have seen how these processes not only occur in simple cognitive tasks, but also in those tasks where a motor response is required. Roig et al (2012) saw how a high intensity exercise session positively affected the execution of a perceptual-motor task 24 hours and 7 days after its first practice. It seems that these benefits could be triggered by an increased secretion of neurotransmitters and neurotrophic substances, that may contribute to the formation of new synapses and to the phenomena called long term potentiation (Skriver et al., 2014).

These advancements in the cognitive and motor learning field may be relevant for human development during childhood. Far from what seems to be the actual trend, we believe that increasing the physical activity volume in school, both through the physical education class and the promotion of games and sports practice, would boost the education and development of children. Further beyond this educational function, physical exercise could also have an important role in the facilitation of treatment of people with motor control or development impairments. As conclusion, physical exercise benefits human learning and development. Consequently, we have to promote, from childhood to elderly, an active and healthy lifestyle.

References:

• Agarwal, S. K. (2012). Cardiovascular benefits of exercise. International Journal of General Medicine, 5, 541–545. doi:10.2147/IJGM.S30113
• Chang, Y.-K., & Etnier, J. L. (2009). Effects of an acute bout of localized resistance exercise on cognitive performance in middle-aged adults: A randomized controlled trial study. Psychology of Sport and Exercise, 10(1), 19–24. doi:10.1016/j.psychsport.2008.05.004
• Guiney, H., & Machado, L. (2013). Benefits of regular aerobic exercise for executive functioning in healthy populations. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 20, 73–86. doi:10.3758/s13423-012-0345-4
• Scudder, M. R., Federmeier, K. D., Raine, L. B., Direito, A., Boyd, J. K., & Hillman, C. H. (2014). The association between aerobic fitness and language processing in children: Implications for academic achievement. Brain and Cognition, 87(1), 140–152. doi:10.1016/j.bandc.2014.03.016
• Skriver, K., Roig, M., Lundbye-Jensen, J., Pingel, J., Helge, J. W., Kiens, B., & Nielsen, J. B. (2014). Acute exercise improves motor memory: Exploring potential biomarkers. Neurobiology of Learning and Memory, 116, 46–58. doi:10.1016/j.nlm.2014.08.004
• Stathopoulou, G., Powers, M. B., Berry, a, Smits, J., & Otto, M. W. (2006). Exercise interventions for mental health: A quantitative and qualitative review. Clinical Psychology- Science and Practice, 13(2), 179–193. doi:10.1111/j.1468-2850.2006.00021.x