Sport has intrinsically rewarding effects: study

Physical activity has intrinsically rewarding effects, said a study on Monday.

Researchers from the University of Goettingen have investigated the influence of sport on the adaptability of the brain and published the results in the Journal of Neuroscience.

As a study with rodents showed, if the rodents have access to a running wheel, they would run voluntarily many miles per day.

Working with rodents, the researchers have found that voluntary running may extend the period of youthful adaptability in the brain into adulthood.

Moreover, this type of youthful adaptability could be restored even in adult mice at an age in which the visual cortices plasticity usually do not exist anymore, said the study.

"A few days of voluntary training in the impeller were enough to allow plastic changes in the brain. This shows us that it is never too late to benefit from exercise," said author of the study Dr. Franziska Greifzu. Endit