Anxiety, Depression and Exercise Flashcards
Mental Health
Successful performance of mental function, resulting in productive activities, fulfilling relationships, and the ability to adapt to change and to cope with adversity
Mental Illness
Collectively refers to all diagnosable mental disorders
Mental Health Problems
Signs/Symptoms of insufficient intensity or duration to meet the criteria/diagnosis for mental disorders
- are sufficient to warrant efforts in health promotion, prevention and treatment
Prevalence of mental illness
1 in 5 Canadians
By the time Canadians reach 40 years of age, 1 in 2 have or have had a mental illness
Who is effected by mental illness
- 70% of mental health problems have their onset during childhood or adolescence
- Young people aged 15 to 24 are more likely to experience mental illness and/or substance use disorders than any other age group
- 1 in 3 Canadian university students report moderate-to-severe anxiety, stress or depression
Def: Anxiety
Pathological counterpart of normal fear, manifest by disturbances of mood, as well as of thinking, behaviour, and physiological activity
Anxiety can become clinical when it results in what
- Behavioral and cognitive changes
- Without a triggering event or threat
- Disproportionate and unmanageable response
Anxiety Disorders
- Panic Disorder and agoraphobia
- Social anxiety disorder
- Specific phobias
- Generalized anxiety disorder
- Obsessive-compulsive disorder
- Post-traumatic stress disorder
Symptomatology of anxiety
- Unpleasant feelings
- Bodily Symptoms
- Changes in cognitions
- Change in behavior
- Vigilance
Key components of GAD`
- Occurring more days than not
- Difficult to control
- Not attributable
Treatments of Anxiety
- Medications
- Psychotherapy (CBT)
Limitations of traditional treatments for anxiety
- Costly
- Side effects
- Time consuming
State Anxiety
A transient emotional state characterized by feelings of apprehension, doom, threat
- Heightened ANS activity
Trait Anxiety
A more general predisposition to respond with apprehension, worry, and nervousness across many situations
- Increased restlessness, difficulty making decisions, feelings of inadequancy
Psychological Measures of anxiety
Self-reports
Physiological measures of Anxiety
- Muscle tension, via EMG
- Blood pressure and HR
- Skin responses
- CNS
Def: Mood disorders
Disorders that influence mood regulation beyond the usual variations between sadness and happiness/excitement
Prevalence of Mood disorders
Approximately 1 in 10 Canadians will be diagnosed with MDD at some point in their life
Common symptoms of depression
- Feelings of sadness or guilt
- Disturbances in appetite or sleep patterns
- Lack of energy
- Difficulty concentrating
- Loss of interest in all/most activities
- Memory problems
- Thoughts of suicide
- Halluncinations
Main Depressive disorders
- Major depressive disorder (Depressive mood)
- Bipolar Disorder (Mania and depression)
- Dysthymia
- Cyclothymia (Depression and mania - less intense)
Criteria for Major Depressive Disorders
- Depressed mood most of the day nearly every day
- Diminished interest/pleasure in all or most activities
- Excessive/inappropriate guilt
Prevalence of MDD
- Women affected 2x more often then men
- Tremendous economic burden
Economic burden of depression on society
- At least 12 billion days of lost productivity per year, costing approximately 925 billion USD
- Account for 14% of years of life lost due to disability
- Rank 2nd only to cardiovascular disease in disease in industrialized nations
Causes of MDD
- Not well understood
- Interaction of genetic, physiological and psychosocial factors
- Responses to stressful events vary by individual
Treatment of Depression
- Often untreated
- Pharmaceuticals and psychotherapy
- PA/exercise might also be useful
Limitations of depression treatment
- Expensive
- Lack of compliance
- Time
- Side effects
- Doesn’t work for everyone
Measuring Depression
- Standard diagnostic criteria
- Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders - Self-reporting measure of symptoms
- Beck depression Inventory
- Zung self-rating depression scale
- Center for epidemiologic studies - depression scale
- others
What is the prevalence of mental illness or addiction every year
1 in 5 Canadians
What are the most common types of mental disorders
Mood and anxiety disorders
Differences in depression prevalence across men and women
1.6x higher in women vs men
- 5.8% vs 3.6
Can physical activity prevent anxiety and depression?
- Greater self-reported physical activity is associated with better mental health and lower symptoms of anxiety and depression
- Higher physical fitness correlated with lower anxiety and depression symptoms
What are the overall impacts of physical activity on mental health
- Buffers against anxiety symptoms and anxiety disorders
- Prevents against depression disorders and decreases risk of occurence
What are the effects of sedentary behaviour on mental health study
- Students asked to be sedentary for 7 days and then return to normal activities after
- Anxiety symptoms measured with the overall anxiety severity and Impairment scale
- Depression symptoms measured by patient health questionnaire-9
- Significant Increase in depression and anxiety seen with sedentary behaviour
Effects of Emotional Exposure on State anxiety after acute exercise
- Regular active young adults
- Exercise for 30 minutes cycling (RPE 13)
- Control 30 min rest
- Reported state anxiety before and 15-min after interventions
- Viewed 90 arousing pleasant, unpleasant and neutral pictures from the international affective picture system for 30 minutes
RESULTS - State anxiety scores decreased after exercise
- Decreased after resting period too
- anxiety scores increased after viewing pictures in rest
- No change in anxiety pics in ex condition
Examining a training effect on the state anxiety repose to an acute bout of exercise in low and high anxious individuals
Are benefits greater for those with higher levels of anxiety and are acute benefits augmented with exercise training?
- Sedentary university students
- 9 week exercise training (30 min mod cycling) or control
- State anxiety measured at before and 10 min after exercise at the end of each week
- Acute exercise lowered anxiety ONLY in the high anxiety group 0 - magnitude of decrease was larger with longer training
- No change in anxiety after acute exercise in the low anxiety group
Possible mechanisms of acute exercise and anxiety
- Thee “Time-out” Hypothesis (break from everyday worries and work)
- Temperature Hypothesis (exercise increases body temperature and leads to a reduction in tension)
- Neurochemical hypothesis (Exercise increases opioids, endocannabinoids, serotonin, dopamine and BDNF)
- Alterations in brain activity during/after exercise (Stronger positive and negative emotional responses)
Role of the amygdala
- Amygdala is responsible for detecting features of the environment
- Amygdala reactivity is response to threatening stimuli associated with anxiety
- Hyper-reactive amygdala in anxiety disorders
- Greater habitual PA leads to lower amygdala reactivity in response to fearful stimuli
- Acute running exercise increased amygdala reactivity to happy images
