The executive brain of the athlete: Examining the effects of fast decision-making and problem-solving on the field on the development of executive functioning

想象一场足球比赛。一名球员带球瞄准球门，两队的球员围绕着她，快速移动位置。她面临着几种可能发生变化的情况：一种是把球传给她可以瞄准的两个队友中的一个;另一种是自己尝试进球，但距离会带来一些风险。她的大脑正在计算，通过调整她的行动来做出决定和解决问题，以赢得时间。她选择球员、瞄准并成功传球。他们得分了。在她的职业生涯中，这种管理策略已经重复了数千次，她不知道的是，她的大脑正在改变，从经验中受益。在这种情况下，越来越多的证据表明，锻炼对一系列基于神经学的认知控制过程有好处，这些过程统称为“执行功能”，这对于驾驭我们的环境，解决问题和决策至关重要，并且在学术和工作表现中发挥着重要作用。运动对执行功能的增强作用至少有三条主要途径：一是运动引起的神经生理学变化，包括能够刺激神经元生长和大脑可塑性的脑内天然物质的上调;第二，心血管功能的增强，这提高了向大脑提供氧气和营养物质的效率，促进为神经元活动提供能量并导致对认知的益处;并且存在尚未被研究的可能的第三途径，并且其涉及运动类型固有的执行需求（例如，战略性，灵活的决策，在团队为基础的运动与个人运动的特点是集中注意力的耐力）。该研究计划旨在以创新的方式评估这些途径，通过：（1）研究运动类型以及心血管能力如何调节运动对执行功能的影响，（2）从我以前的NSERC发现团队格兰特建立，比较运动员和久坐对照组之间执行功能任务表现和行为的试验与试验和学期与学期的变化模式，（3）研究青少年运动员与非运动员同龄人的脑功能神经生理学标志物随时间的变化;青少年是执行功能发展的关键时期，（4）实施以运动为基础的身体活动计划，以检查对执行功能的长期影响，（5）鉴于累积的证据表明，代际传递（父母向子女传递执行能力），性别和社会经济地位在执行功能发展中发挥作用，这项建议包括审查这些变数。这种纵向和程序化的研究将提供多模态的证据，长期运动对执行功能的影响。

Imagine a soccer game. A player is driving the ball aiming at a goal; players from both teams surround her, moving positions fast. She is facing several scenarios with contingencies that are shifting: one involves passing the ball to one of two teammates she could aim for; another involves attempting the goal herself but the distance would take some risks. Her brain is computing, making decisions and problem solving by adjusting her actions to gain time. She selects the player, aims and makes a successful pass. They score. This executive manoeuvre has been repeated thousands of times in her career, and unbeknownst to her, her brain is changing, benefiting from the experience. In this context, converging evidence has demonstrated benefits of exercise to a set of neurological-based cognitive control processes, collectively known as executive function', which is essential to navigate our environment, problem-solve and decision-make, and which plays an important role in academic and job performance.******There are at least three main pathways by which exercise has an enhancing effect on executive function: First, the neurophysiological changes induced by exercise, including up-regulation of naturally occurring brain substances capable of stimulating neuronal growth and brain plasticity; second, the gains in cardiovascular capacity, which enhances the efficiency with which oxygen and nutrients are supplied to the brain, facilitating the provision of energy for neuronal activity and resulting in benefits to cognition; and there is a possible third pathway that has not been examined, and it relates to the executive demands inherent to the type of sport (e.g., strategic, flexible decision-making in team-based sports vs. individual sports characterized by focused attention on endurance). This program of research aims to evaluate those pathways in an innovative manner, by: (1) examining how type of sport as well as cardiovascular capacity moderate the effect of exercise on executive functioning, (2) building from my previous NSERC Discovery team Grant, comparing trial-to-trial and semester-to-semester variability patterns in executive functions task performance and behaviour between athletes and sedentary controls, (3) examining within-person changes of neurophysiological markers of brain function over time in adolescent athletes versus their non-athlete peers; adolescence being a critical period for executive functioning development, (4) implementing a sports-based physical activity program to examine the long-terms effects on executive functioning, and (5) given that cumulative evidence has shown that intergenerational transmission (parent to child transmission of executive abilities), gender, and socioeconomic status play a role in executive function development, this proposal includes examination of these variables. Such longitudinal and programmatic research will provide multimodal evidence of the effects of long-term exercise on executive functioning.