New study suggests acute exercise boosts working memory like caffeine

The study also revealed that high caffeine consumers who drink more than four cups of coffee a day are also more at-risk to some of the negative effects of caffeine.

Researchers at the Western University’s Exercise and Health Psychology Laboratory recently found that just 20-minutes of exercise can improve the working memory of both non-caffeine and caffeine consumers as much as a cup of coffee in the morning. In addition, it may also help reduce the negative effects of caffeine withdrawal-like headaches, fatigue and crankiness.

The study published in Nature Scientific Reports compared the effects of acute moderate-intensity aerobic exercise to caffeine on working memory (WM) and caffeine withdrawal symptoms (CWS). Researchers subsequently found that acute exercise and caffeine significantly improved WM accuracy and reduced CWS comparably.

Working memory, as the study defines, is the ability to store and manipulate information such as remembering items on a grocery list after visiting the store or recalling how each royal is related to one another on The Crown while binge-watching Season 3.

According to Anisa Morava, a graduate student who collaborated with Laboratory director Harry Prapavessis and former student Matthew Fagan for the study, "Healthy individuals drinking two cups of coffee a day are generally OK in the sense that it’s not going to negatively affect most of your physiological functions. However, for special populations that include anxiety sufferers or pregnant women, caffeine consumption can be problematic and should be limited or reduced."

The study also revealed that high caffeine consumers who drink more than four cups of coffee a day are also more at-risk to some of the negative effects of caffeine.