Available online at:
https://cc.arcabc.ca/islandora/object/cc%3Apsycjournal

J Camosun Psyc Res. (2025). Vol. 7(1), pp. 25-37.
Submitted Fall 2024; accepted May 2025.

How Physical Activity Impacts Sustained Attention.
Authors: Jaidyn Salema*
Supervising Instructor: Michael Pollock, Psyc 215 (“Biological Psychology”)
Department of Psychology, Camosun College, 3100 Foul Bay Road, Victoria, BC, Canada V8P 5J2
*Corresponding author email: jdsalema@gmail.com

ABSTRACT
In this paper, I sought to understand the effects of physical activity on sustained attention to
learn whether exercise is a useful tool for people who require continuous focus on a single task
(e.g., students). Previous research has found that increases in attention are associated with
physical activity variables such as the duration of exercise performed, when the exercise is
performed in relation to the mental task that followed, and the intensity of the physical activity.
In my correlational study, I tested the strength of these relationships by examining naturalistic
daily changes in their variables longitudinally over a period of four weeks. I measured duration
of exercise, the interval between exercise and attention task, intensity of exercise in terms of
heart beats per minute through my Fitbit watch, and I measured attention by the percentage of
errors and average reaction time on the Continuous Performance Task (CPT) test. Data from this
correlational study showed no statistical correlation between attention and any of the exercise
variables but did show a trend towards significance for the exercise duration variable. The
findings in this study suggest that the relationship between exercise and attention may not be as
strong as predicted for people in their day-to-day life.
1. Introduction

1.2 Literature Review

1.1 Research Problem

One factor previously found to predict
increased attention is having the physical
activity be performed for more than five
minutes (Altermann & Gropel, 2023; Fenesi
et al., 2018). For example, in an
experimental study by Fenesi et al. (2018),
having two 5-minute calisthenics breaks
within one 50-minute lecture improved
university level students’ attention when
compared to students who instead got a
mind wandering break, or no break at all.
With that, students who took exercise breaks
also found that, subjectively, the content was
easier to understand (Fenesi et al., 2018).
Altermann and Gropel (2023) studied the

Staying on task for long periods of time
can be difficult and may require deep focus
to avoid distraction and procrastination.
Checking devices for notifications and task
switching between studying and scrolling on
social media are common concentration
interruptions. To ensure sustained attention,
it is helpful to know of the lifestyle factors
that could help boost focus. This study aims
to look at the potentiality of physical activity
as an attention-enhancing tool for students
and knowledge workers alike.

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effects of 25-minute endurance, strength, or
coordination exercise on the attention of
high school students. This study showed that
physical activity improved attention
regardless of the type of movement, noting
that exercising for longer stints (25 minutes
when compared to 10- or 15-minute
exercises) may enhance activation of
attention focused brain areas. Based on these
results, the researchers suggested that
exercise improves attention in bursts as low
as five minutes long, but in exercises
performed for longer bursts, the brain gets a
bigger, longer lasting increase in blood flow
that benefits attention specific tasks to a
greater degree.
Another factor previously found to
predict increased focus is having the
exercise follow the mental task almost
immediately (Atakan & Atakan, 2024). For
example, in a correlational study by Atakan
and Atakan (2024), 10th grade students
performed Pilates or plyometric exercises
for 30 minutes followed shortly by a
standardized attention test (d2-test), and then
a 40-minute math test. This study gave
students a 5-minute break between the
physical activity and the attention test and
math test. Atakan and Atakan (2023)
specified that 5 minutes was chosen because
the longer the brain has between exercise
and testing, the less benefit is received by
exercising. Increased blood flow activates
the areas of the brain responsible for
increased focus and attention, while
stopping the exercise decreases the blood
flow back to a resting, unfocused state. In
this study, the authors found that 30 minutes
of moderate intensity Pilates or plyometric
exercises improved students’ attention test
scores as well as their mathematics test
scores when compared to the non-exercise
group. Based on these results, the
researchers suggested that having the
attention task start shortly after the exercise

is completed will ensure that the brain’s
blood flow is still elevated, and the attention
areas of the brain are more activated.
A third factor previously found to predict
increased attention is making sure the
exercise is of at least moderate intensity
(Altermann & Gropel, 2023). For example,
in the randomized controlled study by
Altermann and Gropel (2023), three
different exercises were studied for
increased attention: endurance, strength, and
coordination exercises. High school students
performed one type of exercise for 25
minutes at a moderate or high intensity and
then completed a standardized attention test
(d2-test). The results showed that all three
types of exercise improved attention to a
similar degree. Because different exercises
require different skill levels and can use
different muscle groups, the authors noted
that the overall benefit of exercising in this
study comes from the intensity of the
exercise performed. Since all three exercise
groups reached similar intensity levels,
similar increases in blood flow to the brain
were recorded. Based on these results, the
researchers suggested that exercise improves
attention regardless of the type of exercise if
it is of moderate or high intensity.
1.3 Hypotheses
Based on the above literature review, I
predicted the following hypotheses:
• Hypothesis #1: If exercise duration
increases then attention will increase.
• Hypothesis #2: If the interval
between exercise and attention task
decreases then attention will increase.
• Hypothesis #3: If exercise intensity
increases then attention will increase.
2. Methods
2.1 Participant
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The sole author of this paper served as
the participant in this study. The participant
is a 28-year-old female. The participant is an
undergraduate student at Camosun College
who completed the current study as an
assignment for Psyc 215-001A (“Biological
Psychology”) due to their interest in
physical activity as a tool for increasing
attention. The participant partakes in
moderate intensity exercise in the form of
running, elliptical training, or using the stair
climber machine once a week. They also
partake in daily walks once or twice a day as
part of their job as a dog walker.
2.2 Materials and Procedures
I performed a correlational study to test
concurrently all my hypotheses by
examining naturalistic daily changes in their
variables longitudinally. I always kept a
study journal with me over this study’s fourweek period to record self-observations of
the following 4 variables: (1) exercise
duration, (2) interval between exercise and
attention, (3) exercise intensity, and (4)
attention.
2.2.1 Exercise Duration
To measure exercise duration, the
participant used their Fitbit application on
their Fitbit watch to track how long they
exercised for. During the study period, the
participant’s form of exercise was running
and walking. The participant used the
activity button on their Fitbit watch that
corresponded to the type of exercise they
were about to perform and hit the start
button to track their exercise duration
immediately before beginning their exercise.
The participant ended the exercise on their
Fitbit watch immediately after finishing their
exercise. The participant then logged the
exercise activity information available in

their Fitbit application in their study journal.
The total duration of exercise performed
during the day was added at the end of each
day and logged in the study journal. If
exercise had not been performed on one of
the correlational study days, the participant
recorded the exercise duration for that day as
zero.
2.2.2 Interval Between Exercise and
Attention
To measure the interval between exercise
and performing an attention task, the
participant used the clock on their watch to
track how many minutes passed between the
last exercise performed and the attention
task. The number of minutes was recorded
in the participant’s study journal. If exercise
had not been performed before the attention
task was to be completed, the participant
recorded the lack of exercise in the study
journal and that day’s interval data was not
analyzed.
2.2.3 Exercise Intensity
To measure the intensity of the exercise
performed, the participant tracked their heart
rate using their Fitbit watch. The Fitbit
application tracks beats per minute (BPM)
and labels the intensity of the exercise as
follows: below 109BPM is light, 109135BPM is moderate, 136-170BPM is
vigorous and above 171BPM is peak
intensity. The intensity levels are based on
the participant’s logged weight (54
kilograms) and height (167 centimeters).
The time spent in each level of intensity
throughout the exercise was logged in the
participant’s study journal. The average
intensity level of the exercise was tracked by
looking at the average heart rate in BPM on
the Fitbit application and then recorded in
the study journal. The average intensity level
of exercise throughout the entire day was
also measured by adding each exercise’s
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average BPMs and dividing by how many
exercises were performed. If exercise was
not performed, the participant left that day
blank in their journal.
2.2.4 Attention
To measure attention, the participant
performed the Continuous Performance
Task (CPT) test (Conners, 1985) on their
tablet at two intervals every day for 28 days.
The CPT test measures sustained attention
and distractibility. During the test, the
participant is shown randomized letters (AZ). The participant is to hit the spacebar on
all letters except for the letter X. The
participant completed the test at 7:00am and
8:00pm every day. The percentage of errors
and average reaction time in milliseconds
for the 8:00pm test were recorded in the
participant’s study journal.
2.3 Planned Analyses
To assess the strength and statistical
significance of associations between
variables predicted by the 3 hypotheses, I
performed Pearson product moment
correlations of the predictor variables
(exercise duration, interval between exercise
and attention task, and exercise intensity)
with their outcome variable (increased
attention). For testing Hypothesis #1, I
correlated the duration of exercise
performed throughout the day (in minutes)
with the participant’s average reaction time
and percentage of errors on the CPT test
performed that day. For testing Hypothesis
#2, I correlated the interval between the last
exercise and the attention task with the
participant’s average reaction time and
percentage of errors on the CPT test
performed that day. For testing Hypothesis
#3, I correlated the average exercise
intensity for the day in BPMs with the
participant’s average reaction time and

percentage of errors on the CPT test
performed that day. A correlation coefficient
was considered statistically significant if the
probability of its random occurrence (p) was
< .05 (i.e., less than 5% of the time expected
by chance alone).
3. Results
Exercise was performed on 28 of the 33
days of this correlational study. The results
of this study (see Table 1) showed no
statistically significant correlation between
the different exercise variables and sustained
attention. However, the correlation between
exercise duration and attention did show a
trend towards significance using as a
measure of attention on the CPT test the
percentage of errors made (r = -0.34, p =
0.051; see Figure 1) but not the average
reaction time (r = 0.03, p = 0.86; see Figure
2). No significant correlation was found for
the interval between exercise and attention
task variable and attention scores using
either using the percentage of errors made (r
= 0.15, p = 0.44; see Figure 3) or the
average reaction time (r = -0.09, p = 0.64;
see Figure 4). Similarly, no significant
correlation was found between exercise
intensity and attention using either using the
percentage of errors made (r = -0.20, p =
0.31; see Figure 5) or the average reaction
time (r = -0.09, p = 0.64; see Figure 6). The
relationship between sustained attention and
exercise duration showed the most
promising results, with an r-value of
medium effect size and a p-value on the
cusp of statistical significance.
4. Discussion
4.1 Summary of Results
This correlational study looked at the
effect of exercise on sustained focus. This
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was studied by comparing exercise intensity,
the interval between exercise and attentional
task, and exercise duration to attention by
the percentage of errors and reaction time on
the CPT test. The study did not statistically
support any of the hypotheses. However, the
hypothesis that an increase in exercise
duration would decrease the percentage of
errors on the CPT test trended towards
significance.
4.2 Relation of Results to Past Research
The first hypothesis stated that an
increase in exercise duration will increase
attention. The hypothesis was based on
studies done by Altermann and Gropel
(2023) and Fenesi et al. (2018) that both
looked at the effects of exercise breaks on
the ability to perform attention tasks. This
correlational study did not support their
findings in a statistically significant way, but
the variable did trend towards significance.
Although it did not support these research
studies, this could have been due to the
correlational framework of this study. Every
exercise logged throughout the study was
over 5 minutes long, as suggested by Fenesi
et al. (2018), but failed to elicit the same
outcome. Since Fenesi et al. (2018) and
Altermann and Gropel (2023) both
performed randomized control studies, the
difference in their studies versus this
naturalistic study could play a part in the
difference in results. The difference in
results could also stem from this study
having a single participant, as there is a
chance that the one participant may be an
outlier.
The second hypothesis was if the
interval between exercise and the attention
task decreased, then attention would
increase. Atakan and Atakan (2024) showed
this to be the case in their study on high
school students. The students who

performed a bout of exercise before
completing a math test did better on the test
than those that did not. This correlational
study’s statistics leaned the right way in
supporting the theory, but did not reach
significance. The average interval between
exercise and attention in this study was 387
minutes (6.45 hours), and ranged from a
minimum of 90 minutes (1.5 hours) to a
maximum of 728 minutes (12.13 hours).
Visual examination of the scatterplot
between these two variables in this study
failed to show any pattern to the length of
time between exercise and the attention task
and attention performance. However, the
discrepancy in results between our study and
the Atakan and Atakan (2023) study could
be from the timing this study chose to test
attention. The CRT test was done at 8:00pm
every day, which was at the end of the
participant’s day. Lifestyle factors including
their job, studying, or general fatigue could
play a role in the participant’s CRT test
results. Since Atakan and Atakan (2023)
used high school students at their school for
their study, their attention test could be done
earlier in the day, eliciting different results.
The final hypothesis was that an
increase in exercise intensity would also
increase attention. Altermann and Gropel
(2023) tested this through looking at three
different types of exercises, all at the same
intensity level (moderately high), and their
effects on attention. Their study showed that
regardless of the exercise performed, if it is
of a high enough intensity, attention
improves. This correlational study did not
help to support their findings, perhaps due to
a lack of variability in heart rate. In this
study, there was only one day over the span
of 4 weeks that the heart rate of the
participant reached vigorous intensity (as per
Fitbit’s “Heart Rate Zones”). Although the
majority of days the participant’s heart rate
was in the ‘moderate’ zone, it was on the
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lower end of the moderate zone, with the
average heart rate over the course of the
study being 113BPMs. Since Altermann and
Gropel’s (2023) research stated their effects
were seen at moderately high levels, this
study may not have had enough moderately
high BPM days to conclude a similar
outcome.
4.3 Implications of Results
This study looked at the effects of
exercise on attention in hopes of proving it
to be a focus-enhancing tool. Since this
study did not reach statistical significance in
any of the hypotheses tested, it suggests that
the theory that exercise improves attention
can only be reached in a controlled,
experimental study. This study was
naturalistic, so the participant lived their
normal life while logging their exercise and
attention data. The results show that for the
average person, regular exercise in a normal
range of intensities may not have as big of
an effect on attention as experimental
studies suggest. Although exercise is shown
to be pivotal for overall well-being
(Beniwal, 2024), this study points to the
direct effect of exercise on attention not
being as strong for people outside of
laboratories.

References
Altermann, W., & Gropel, P. (2023). Effects
of acute endurance, strength, and
coordination exercise interventions on
attention in adolescents: A randomized
controlled study. Psychology of Sport and
Exercise, 64, 102300.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychsport.2022.
102300
Atakan, M. M., & Atakan, B. (2024). Acute
pilates and plyometric exercise in schoolbased settings improve attention and
mathematics performance in high school
students. Sports Medicine and Health
Science, 6(2), 185–192.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.smhs.2023.12.00
8
Beniwal, S. (2024). Exploring the effects of
physical exercise on mental well-being:
A study from urban India. Indian Journal
of Positive Psychology, 15(2), 206–209.
Conners, C.K. (1985). The computerized
continuous performance test.
Psychopharmacology Bulletin, 21, 891892.
Fenesi, B., Lucibello, K., Kim, J. A., &
Heisz, J. J. (2018). Sweat so you don’t
forget: Exercise breaks during a
university lecture increase on-task
attention and learning. Journal of Applied
Research in Memory and Cognition, 7(2),
261–269.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jarmac.2018.01.
012

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31

Table 1
Correlations for Study Variables

Variables
Exercise Duration & Attention
Interval Between Exercise and
Attention & Attention
Exercise Intensity & Attention

Attention Measure Used
Percentage of Errors
Avg. Reaction Time
r
n
r
n
-0.34

33

0.03

33

0.15

28

-0.09

28

-0.20

28

-0.09

28

* p < .05.

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32

Figure 1
Association Between Exercise Duration and Attention (Percentage of Errors)

Attention (Percentage of Errors)

40%

35%
30%
25%
20%
15%
10%
5%
0%

0

20

40

60
80
Exercise Duration (Minutes)

100

120

140

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PHYSICAL ACTIVITY AND ATTENTION

33

Figure 2
Association Between Exercise Duration and Attention (Average Reaction Time)

Attention (Average Reaction Time in
Milliseconds)

380
370
360
350
340
330
320
310
0

20

40

60
80
100
Exercise Duration (Minutes)

120

140

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PHYSICAL ACTIVITY AND ATTENTION

34

Figure 3
Association Between Interval Between Exercise and Attention and Attention (Percentage of
Errors)

Attention (Percentage of Errors)

25%

20%

15%

10%

5%

0%
0

100

200
300
400
500
600
Interval Between Exercise and Attention (Minutes)

700

800

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PHYSICAL ACTIVITY AND ATTENTION

35

Figure 4
Association Between the Interval Between Exercise and Attention and Attention (Average
Reaction Time)

Attention (Average reaction time in
milliseconds)

380
370
360
350

340
330
320
310
0

100

200
300
400
500
600
Interval Between Exercise and Attention (Minutes)

700

800

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PHYSICAL ACTIVITY AND ATTENTION

36

Figure 5
Association Between Exercise Intensity and Attention (Percentage of Errors)

Attention (Percentage of Errors)

25%

20%

15%

10%

5%

0%

90

100
110
120
130
140
150
Exercise Intensity (Average Heart Rate in Beats Per Minute)

160

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37

Figure 6
Association Between Exercise Intensity and Attention (Average Reaction Time)

Attention (average reaction time in
milliseconds)

380
370
360
350
340
330
320
310
90

100
110
120
130
140
150
Exercise Intensity (Average Heart Rate in Beats per Minute)

160

37