ArticleBehavioral sleep medicine
Physical Activity and Cognition: A Mediating Role of Efficient Sleep.
Article in Behavioral sleep medicine. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 46 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
46 citing papers in PubMed.
- Does Sleep Moderate the Effects of Exercise Training or Complex Mental and Social Activities on Cognitive Function in Adults With Chronic Stroke? Secondary Analysis of a Randomized Trial.The journals of gerontology. Series A, Biological sciences and medical sciences · 2024Trial
- Change in Sleep Latency as a Mediator of the Effect of Physical Activity Intervention on Executive Functions Among Children with ADHD: A Secondary Analysis from a Randomized Controlled Trial.Journal of autism and developmental disorders · 2024Trial
- Trial
- Effect of exergaming on wellbeing of residents in a nursing home: a single blinded intervention study.Aging clinical and experimental research · 2022Trial
- Article
- When Screens Replace Sleep: Short Video Addiction Impairs Executive Function Through Sleep Disruption in Youth-Is Physical Activity the Antidote?Brain and behavior · 2026Article
- Tailoring Evaluations of Chronic Rhinosinusitis: Understanding Sleep and Its Effect on Memory Through Actigraphy.Journal of personalized medicine · 2025Article
- Chain-mediation effect of cognitive flexibility and depression on the relationship between physical activity and insomnia in adolescents.BMC psychology · 2025Article
- Effectiveness of Physical Activity-Led Workplace Health Promotion Interventions: A Systematic Review.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Review
- Physical activity and cognitive function among community-dwelling older adults: a mediating role of functional fitness.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Cognitive performance, sleep quality and physical activity as predictors of functional mobility in older adults.Frontiers in aging neuroscience · 2025Article
- Engagement in moderate-intensity physical activity supports overnight memory retention in older adults.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Actigraphy Estimated Sleep Moderates the Relationship between Physical Activity and Cognition in Older Adults.Mental health and physical activity · 2024Article
- Physical activity and arterial stiffness: is body fat a mediator?European journal of applied physiology · 2024Article
- The Interactive Role of Sleep and Circadian Rhythms in Episodic Memory in Older Adults.The journals of gerontology. Series A, Biological sciences and medical sciences · 2023Review
- A two-week exercise intervention improves cold symptoms and sleep condition in cold-sensitive women.Journal of physiological anthropology · 2023Article
- Joint associations of physical activity and sleep duration with cognitive ageing: longitudinal analysis of an English cohort study.The lancet. Healthy longevity · 2023Article
- Move Your Body, Boost Your Brain: The Positive Impact of Physical Activity on Cognition across All Age Groups.Biomedicines · 2023Review
- Understanding heterogeneity of responses to, and optimizing clinical efficacy of, exercise training in older adults: NIH NIA Workshop summary.GeroScience · 2023Review
- Subjective and objective sleep quality does not predict behavioural episodic foresight in younger or older adults.Scientific reports · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
Abstract
objectivePhysical activity benefits executive control, but the mechanism through which this benefit occurs is unclear. Sleep is a candidate mechanism given that it improves with exercise and has restorative effects on the prefrontal cortex. The present cross-sectional study examined the mediating role of sleep in the relationship between physical activity and executive control in young and older adults.
participantsYoung (n = 59) and older (n = 53) community-dwelling adults ages 21-30 and 55-80.
methodsParticipants wore an accelerometer for one week to assess sleep efficiency, total sleep time, and physical activity, operationalized as metabolic equivalent of task (METs) during time spent awake. Cognition was assessed in the laboratory across multiple measures of executive control, memory recall, and processing speed. Mediation analyses tested the role of sleep efficiency in the cross-sectional relationship between METs and cognitive performance accounting for age, sex, and education.
resultsMETs were significantly associated with performance before, but not after accounting for covariates. METs were associated with sleep efficiency but not total sleep time. Sleep efficiency, but not total sleep time, mediated the relationship between METs and working memory, switching, verbal ability and fluency, and recall. Age group did not moderate the mediating role of sleep efficiency in the relationship between METs and performance.
conclusionSleep efficiency is one pathway by which physical activity may be associated with executive control across young and older adults.
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Registered trials
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