The impaired visual working memory of overweight and its intervention via six-week Tabata training: behavioral and...

Overweight individuals often experience impairments in executive function, particularly working memory. Physical exercise has been shown to mitigate such cognitive decline and modulate brain activities. This study aimed to investigate whether a six-week high-intensity interval (HIIT) Tabata exercise could improve working memory performance in overweight individuals and explore the associated neural mechanisms. To achieve this aim, two experiments were conducted. In Experiment 1, 20 overweight (Body Mass Index, BMI ≥ 24) and 20 health-weight university students completed the n-back task (n = 0 ~ 2) to assess working memory. Results confirmed that overweight participants exhibited lower accuracy (ACC) in the 2-back task compared with health-weight participants. Accordingly, in Experiment 2, another 40 overweight university students were randomly assigned into the training group (six-week HIIT Tabata) or control group (no physical exercise). All the participants performed the 2-back task with EEG recording at two points: before and after the six-week intervention (pre-test vs. post-test). Results showed that compared to pre-test, the training group showed higher accuracy at the post-test, whereas no such change was observed in the control group. Moreover, ERP results revealed a reduction in post-test P2 amplitude in the training group. Overall, this study demonstrates that being overweight negatively impacts working memory, while a six-week HIIT Tabata intervention may help alleviate these deficits, possibly through more efficient neural resource utilization.