Exercise Improves Academic Performance
Alexander Cappelen, Gary Charness, Mathias Ekström, Uri Gneezy and Bertil Tungodden have published the working paper "Exercise Improves Academic Performance".
Cappelen et al. did a randomized controlled trial testing whether incentivizing physical exercise improves the academic performance of college students and as expected, the intervention increased physical activity.
Physical activity generates a strong and significant improvement in academic performance, particularly for students who struggled at the baseline in terms of lifestyle habits. This seems to be because students who were incentivized to exercise have a healthier life style and improved self-control. Incentivizing students to exercise can be an important tool in improving educational achievements.
The paper is available as a working paper from the Department of Economics.
Mathias Ekström was interviewed by Dagsrevyen on the findings of the paper.