Abstract
Evidence shows that regular physical exercise reduces physiological reactivity to psychosocial stress. However, previous research mainly focused on the effect of endurance exercise, with only a few studies looking at the effect of resistance exercise. The current study tested whether individuals who regularly participate in either endurance or resistance training differ from untrained individuals in adrenal and cardiovascular reactivity to psychosocial stress. Twelve endurance-trained men, 10 resistance-trained men, and 12 healthy but untrained men were exposed to a standardized psychosocial stressor, the Trier Social Stress Test. Measurements of heart rate, free salivary cortisol levels, and mood were obtained throughout the test and compared among the three groups. Overall, both endurance- and resistance-trained men had lower heart rate levels than untrained men, indicating higher cardiac performance of the trained groups. Trained men also exhibited lower heart rate responses to psychosocial stress compared with untrained men. There were no significant group differences in either cortisol responses or mood responses to the stressor. The heart rate results are consistent with previous studies indicating reduced cardiovascular reactivity to psychosocial stress in trained individuals. These findings suggest that long-term endurance and resistance trainings may be related to the same cardiovascular benefits, without exhibiting strong effects on the cortisol reactivity to stress.
Highlights
The World Health Organization calls stress as one of the greatest health risks of the 21st century (Leka et al, 2003)
The inclusion of age as covariate did not significantly change the results. These results indicate that the study groups did neither differ in basic regulation of the HPA, nor in the level of chronic stress and any different responses to the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) between the groups cannot be attributed to differences on these variables
This study tested whether individuals who engage regularly and long-term in either endurance or resistance training differ from untrained individuals in adrenal, cardiovascular, and psychological responses to a standardized psychosocial stressor
Summary
The World Health Organization calls stress as one of the greatest health risks of the 21st century (Leka et al, 2003). Regular physical activity has been identified as one means of effective prevention, with convincing evidence of its protective effects against stress-related diseases (Gerber and Pühse, 2009; Goldstein, 2010; Li and Siegrist, 2012; Gerber et al, 2014). These benefits are mediated through a number of mechanisms, including reduced reactivity of the sympathetic nervous system and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis to psychological stressors (Hamer et al, 2006; Sothmann, 2006). Evidence whether or not long-term resistance training has the same psychophysiological benefits as long-term endurance training is still missing from the literature
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