THE ACUTE EFFECTS OF EXERGAME ON BRAIN FUNCTIONS IN ELDERLY

Abstract

Although aging population in Thailand is expected to increase rapidly, only one-sixteenth of the elderly engage in regularly physical exercise. Inactivity in ageing found to be associated with an increased incident of many chronic diseases such as hypertension, diabetes, Alzheimer's disease etc. Therefore performing regular exercise should recommend since it can exert its positive effect on the ageing’s physiological performance and brain functions. The purpose of this study was to investigate the acute effects of aerobic exercise by playing exergames on brain waves in sedentary elderly. Twenty volunteers aged 55 to 70 years (n=20; 10 male and 10 female) who did the exercise less than/equal two days per week and, no exergames experience. They were divided into two groups: control group (n=10) and exergames group (n=10). The exergames group was performed an aerobic exercise by playing exergames with moderate intensity (50% - 70% HRmax) for 20 minutes and recorded the EEG before and after playing games using NeXus-10 device. The results showed that in exergames group, beta wave was significantly increased (p<0.05) after exercise when compared with control group. These changes indicate the activating effect of exercise by increasing cortical activities in the cerebral cortex, which is related to the arousal. This mechanism may be related to an increase of the blood flow to the brain after exercise. In conclusion, playing exergames, as an aerobic exercise, has positive effects to increase arousal and improve brain functions, suggesting a useful method to slow down the degeneration of the brain functions in the elderly.

(Journal of Sports Science and Technology 2015;15(1): 131-140 )