ArticleBehavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland)2025
The Effects of Acute Cognitively Engaging Physical Activity on Executive Function in Preschool Children: Evidence from Behavioral and fNIRS Measures.
Article in Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland), 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 5 papers.
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Who cites it
5 citing papers in PubMed.
- Early Childhood Movement- and Arts-Based Experiences and Executive Functions: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Evaluating a neural-efficiency account of the association between motor competence and attentional stability in preschoolers: An fNIRS study.Developmental cognitive neuroscience · 2026Article
- Effects of a Brief Music-Movement Active Break on Executive Functions, Mathematics, and Engagement in Preschool Children.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Impact of a physical-cognitive intervention on emotional regulation and school adjustment in primary school children.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Article
- Associations between objectively measured physical activity intensities and executive function in preschool children: a cross-sectional study.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2026Article
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Executive function is crucial for the physical and mental health as well as social adaptation of preschool children, and cognitively engaging physical activity may serve as an effective intervention. This study employed a pre-post experimental design with a repeated measures ANOVA to examine the intervention effects and underlying mechanisms of a 20 min cognitively engaging physical activity on preschool children's executive function. A total of 56 preschool children were recruited and randomly assigned to either the cognitively engaging physical activity group or the conventional physical activity group. Executive function was assessed before and after the intervention using Go/No-Go, 1-back, and dimension-changing card classification tasks. Functional near-infrared spectroscopy was employed to monitor changes in oxygenated hemoglobin concentration in the prefrontal cortex during cognitive tasks. Results indicate that acute cognitively engaging physical activity effectively modulates oxygenated hemoglobin concentration in specific regions of the prefrontal cortex in preschool children, leading to an immediate enhancement in working memory capacity. This approach demonstrates potential advantages in inhibitory control, while no significant differences were observed in cognitive flexibility. Furthermore, post-intervention changes in inhibitory control and working memory showed significant positive correlations with changes in prefrontal oxygenated hemoglobin concentration. These findings provide scientific evidence for applying cognitive engagement elements in cognitive development and theoretical support for designing targeted physical activity interventions.
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