Involvement of Dopamine in Cognitive Improvement by Aerobic Exercise

It has been suggested that acute physical exercise at low to moderate intensity improves cognitive function, as shown by improvements in cognitive performance. Decades of research have explored or discussed physiological mechanisms underlying cognitive improvements induced by acute exercise. However, the precise physiological mechanisms responsible for improvements in cognitive function remain to be elucidated. There is a large body of evidence to suggest that cognitive function is linked with dopamine (DA) in the brain. Rodent studies have shown that acute exercise releases neurotransmitters in the brain. Recent studies using positron emission tomography (PET) have also suggested that acute exercise released endogenous DA in humans. Furthermore, it appears that endogenous DA release is linked with improvements in cognitive function induced by acute exercise. Therefore, in this chapter, we focus on DA and discuss it as a promising candidate to account for exercise-cognition interaction, particularly improvement in cognitive function induced by acute exercise. We propose that further studies using PET would be helpful to progress our understanding of improvements in cognitive function induced by acute exercise.