Period 2 week 4
This week’s subject – mental illnesses, was the most interesting one so far. Amazing how a few silly molecules can affect our lives so significantly. Chronic stress may be something many of us experience during our studies where the amount of leisure time, for example, goes to correcting the smallest things in our results. For this, a principle used in sports programming may be useful and converted to studying: block periodization and correct specificity towards the subject at least while the learning aspects are more general.
During the lecture I asked about the hormonal effects of exercising to naturally increase the amount of T, DA and 5-H5 over a longer period of time as hormonal substitutes commonly have significant side effects (even towards the negative). I got the answer that physical therapy is commonly used aside psychotherapy. However, I would still like to think only physical therapy is not nearly enough for longer term development especially for younger subjects as the perception of succeeding and advancing is a crucial part in the release of the before mentioned hormones. I would like to correct this question by: “Is there any scientifically researched periodically progressive programming methods used to contribute exercise for the subject in psychotherapy?” If there is, is there information on if increasing volume during the block or increasing the relative intensity per session is better for hormonal responses?
In response to Osku’s thoughts:
I found this review on exercise therapy in major depressive disorder (DOI: 10.3109/09638288.2014.972579). The general takeaway was that exercise may be comparable to psychiatric therapy or antidepressive therapy. This would be helpful for milder cases of MDD but not enough for a severe case. Furthermore, patients of MDD usually have a very low drive to exercise, which is why exercise may be a good complementary for psychotherapy. The thought is that exercise may promote plasticity and cell proliferation in the brain. What are your thoughts?
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