The effects of combining visual-auditory stimuli with exercise on short-term affect improvement: a randomized controlled trial

• Published in: Scientific reports 2024-08, Vol.14 (1), p.18995-13
• Main Authors: Tao, Meng, Huang, Haiquan, Gao, Jingchuan, Cao, Yuanyuan, Zhuang, Jie
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: 631/443; 631/477; 692/700; 704/172; Acoustic Stimulation - methods; Adult; Aerobic exercise; Aerobics; Affect - physiology; Age composition; Auditory stimuli; Blood pressure; Blood Pressure - physiology; Computer applications; Emotions; Exercise; Exercise - physiology; Female; Heart rate; Heart Rate - physiology; Heart rate variability; Humanities and Social Sciences; Humans; Male; multidisciplinary; Music; Natural environment; Photic Stimulation - methods; Physical fitness; Physiological responses; Science; Science (multidisciplinary); Sensory integration; Short-term affect; Statistical analysis; Variance analysis; Virtual Reality; Visual stimuli; Young Adult
• ISSN: 2045-2322; 2045-2322
• DOI: 10.1038/s41598-024-69578-y

Abstrac t Prior research has explored the effects of engaging with real or virtual natural landscapes and listening to music during aerobic exercise on short-term affect, however, the specific differences in the improvement of short-term affect by different combinations of Virtual Reality (VR) and music rhythm require further investigation. The objective of this study is to investigate the effects of various combinations of VR and music on short-term mood, thereby providing a reference for future research on public fitness. This study recruited 132 valid participants (mean age 24.0 ± 0.9 years), with a gender distribution of 68 males and 64 females. Participants were randomly assigned to one of four groups: Visual-Music (V-M), Music-Visual (M-V), Visual-only (V), and Music-only (M). The exercise mode was 15 min of aerobic power cycling with 2 min of low-intensity power cycling intervals in the middle. After the exercise, the participants were asked to sit and then performed either a VR intervention or a music intervention for 15 min. The collected indicators included blood pressure, positive/negative affect, and heart rate variability indicators (RMSSD, SDNN, LF/HF). Data analysis included descriptive statistics, repeated measures ANOVA, and multifactor ANOVA. The effect of different VR and Music combined with exercise interventions on the improvement of short-term affect was analyzed based on the effect size (ɳp 2 ) and combined with the significance p-value. Intra-group results showed that DBP, positive and negative affect, SDNN, RMSSD indicators in V-M group were significant differences ( p