Open AccessMental Fatigue Might Be Not So Bad for Exercise Performance After All: A Systematic Review and Bias-Sensitive Meta-Analysis
Author(s) -
Darías Holgado,
Daniel Sanabria,
José C. Perales,
Miguel A. Vadillo
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
journal of cognition
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2514-4820
DOI - 10.5334/joc.126
Subject(s) - meta analysis , publication bias , psychology , mental fatigue , systematic review , scientific literature , cognitive psychology , cognition , applied psychology , clinical psychology , medline , medicine , psychiatry , political science , paleontology , biology , law
There is an ongoing debate in the scientific community regarding whether a state of mental fatigue may have a negative effect upon a range of objective and subjective measures of human performance. This issue has attracted attention from several fields, including sport and exercise sciences. In fact, a considerable body of literature in the sport science field has suggested that performing a long and demanding cognitive task might lead to a state of mental fatigue, impairing subsequent exercise performance, although research in this field has shown contradictory results. Here, we performed a meta-analysis to investigate these inconsistent findings. The analysis yielded small-to-medium effects of mental fatigue on exercise performance, d z = 0.50, and RPE, d z = 0.21. However, a three-parameter selection model also revealed evidence of publication or reporting biases, suggesting that the bias-corrected estimates might be substantially lower (0.08 and 0.10, respectively) and non-significant. In sum, current evidence does not provide conclusive support for the claim that mental fatigue has a negative influence on exercise performance.