Beeksma, G.I. (2015) Shaking the brain: chronic effects of passive Whole Body Vibration on cognition in healthy adults and elderly. thesis, Human Movement Sciences.
Full text available on request.Abstract
Background: Aging is related to cognitive decline. Since the number of elderly is increasing rapidly, it is important to improve or counter the age-related cognitive decline, both from a personal and societal perspective. Passive Whole Body Vibration (WBV) might be a way to accomplish this. It involves artificially given vibrations during sitting, with fixed parameters for frequency and amplitude. In this study the positive chronic effect of passive WBV on cognition in healthy adults and elderly was investigated. Method: In total, fourteen adults (mean age 52.14 ± 5.93 years) and thirteen elderly (mean age 78.00 ± 11.05 years) participated in this study. The intervention consisted of four minutes of passive WBV, four times a week for five weeks. The experimental and control group received 1 mm vibrations of respectively 30 Hz and 1 Hz. Cognition was measured with neuropsychological tests. Results: The adult experimental group improved significantly more than the control group on the Trailmaking test A (+5.9% vs. -0.3%) and the digit span backward test (+1.6% vs. -15.7%). The elderly experimental group improved significantly more on the digit span forward test (+3.9% vs. -9.4%). In addition, both the adult and elderly experimental group improved more on the Stroop Color-Word Interference test (+19.4% and +25.0%) than the control groups (+11.7% and +5.8%), but the differences were non-significant. There was no difference in gain score for spatial short-term memory, set shifting and spatial (working) memory. Conclusion: It seems that passive WBV has a positive chronic effect on visuomotor speed and attention in the adult group and on response inhibition in both age groups. WBV does not have an effect on verbal working memory and short-term memory, since the effects were partially due to a decrease in performance of the control group. To confirm this conclusion, further research should include more participants. Further research should also investigate the effects of WBV on cognition in vulnerable elderly (e.g. Mild Cognitive Impairment).
| Item Type: | Thesis (UNSPECIFIED) |
|---|---|
| Supervisor name: | Heuvelen, dr. M.J.G. van and Zee, prof. dr. E.A. van der |
| Faculty: | Medical Sciences |
| Date Deposited: | 06 Apr 2022 09:34 |
| Last Modified: | 06 Apr 2022 09:34 |
| URI: | https://umcg.studenttheses.ub.rug.nl/id/eprint/3065 |
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