Exercise is known to benefit mental health, reducing anxiety and depression, while increasing energy and mood. But a new study suggests that its benefits don’t stop there.
In particular, regular aerobic exercise also appears to improve our ability to perceive internal body signals, a skill known as interoception. This “eighth sense” includes the perception of heart rate, breathing, hunger, thirst, and other internal states, and is closely linked to the way we regulate our emotions and make decisions.
At this point, it’s worth mentioning that most of us are familiar with the five basic senses: sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch.
But scientists add others: proprioception, which helps us perceive our body’s position in space, and vestibular sense, which is related to our balance.
The experiment: 12 weeks of cycling
The study, published in Psychology of Sport and Exercise (“Long-term aerobic exercise enhances interoception and reduces symptoms of depression and anxiety in physically inactive young adults: A randomized controlled trial“), examined 62 healthy young people aged 18 to 32 who did not exercise systematically. The participants were randomly divided into two groups:
- Exercise group: followed a 12-week program on a stationary bike, three times a week. The first six weeks included continuous, moderate-intensity cycling. The next six were intermittent, alternating between high and low intensity.
- Control group: continued their daily habits without organized physical activity. Intuitive perception was assessed with the “heartbeat counting test,” where participants attempted to count their own heartbeats without consulting their pulse. The accuracy of this estimate is called IAcc (Interoceptive Accuracy), while the confidence they felt about it is called ICon (Interoceptive Confidence).
After each attempt, participants rated how confident they felt about their estimate. They also completed questionnaires about depression, anxiety, and “self-confidence,” the feeling that they could cope with difficult situations. Measurements were taken at the beginning, at six weeks, and after the program was completed.
The results: An initial increase, then a plateau
After six weeks, the exercise group showed:
- Greater accuracy in detecting their heart rate
- Greater confidence in this ability
- Reduced symptoms of anxiety and depression
- Increased belief in their abilities
These improvements were maintained until the end but did not increase further in the higher intensity phase. Lead researcher, Tomasz S. Ligeza, of the Jagiellonian University, explains that this may be due to the “ceiling effect.” That is, in healthy young adults, further increases in intensity or longer duration of the program may not provide additional benefits in mood or “cardiocognition.”
Finally, the control group showed no noticeable change in any of the indicators.
Why is intuitive perception important?
Good intuitive perception helps us regulate emotions, make decisions, and understand our body’s needs. It’s not just a biological curiosity. On the contrary, reduced levels of this ability have been linked to mental disorders such as anxiety, depression, eating disorders, and chronic pain.
However, the study had two major limitations. First, the control group did not do any organized activity, so the differences may be related to the exercise group’s consistent routine. Second, it was not proven whether the improvement in intuitive perception caused the better mood or was simply a side effect.
In the future, the researchers plan to continue investigating the psychophysiological mechanisms that link physical activity to mental function, as well as to develop more personalized exercise “prescriptions.”
