An Acute Bout of Dynamic Sitting Exercises Improves Stroop Performance and Quality of Sleep in Older Adults with Cognitive Impairment

Aims: The study was aimed at identifying the acute effects of dynamic sitting exercises (DSE) on Stroop performance and quality of sleep in elderly persons with cognitive impairment. Materials and Methods: Sixty.eight elderly males with cognitive impairment were attended in research voluntarily, following screening tests, 62 participants were assigned randomly assigned to either DSE or control groups. At the end, 5 participants discontinued from the study. The experimental group participated in eight sessions of DSE in 2 weeks (four sessions a week). The exercise protocol consisted of stepping patterns on a chair; stretching and finger movements. The Stroop test was used to evaluate the cognitive performance of participants before and after exercise intervention. Actiwatch 7 was used to measure sleep quality. Paired t.test and independent t.test were used to analyze the data. Results: It was suggested that Stroop performance was positively affected by DSE (P . 0.05); meanwhile, no statistically significant change was found in the control group (P . 0.05). All parameters of sleep patterns, including sleep efficiency, wake after sleep onset, and movement and fragmentation index, were improved significantly (P . 0.05). Conclusion: Although the aging process besides the environmental factors, especially lifestyle could result in cognitive impairment, DSE would improve the cognitive performance in Stroop performance test.