Summary: While much research has shown that exercise can be good for our brains, the link between how physical activity benefits the brain is not clearly understood. In a new study, researchers suggest the link between brain health and exercise could be a product of our evolutionary history and our hunter-gatherer past.

Source: University of Arizona.

Mounting scientific evidence shows that exercise is good not only for our bodies, but for our brains. Yet, exactly why physical activity benefits the brain is not well understood.

In a new article published in the journal Trends in Neurosciences, University of Arizona researchers suggest that the link between exercise and the brain is a product of our evolutionary history and our past as hunter-gatherers.

UA anthropologist David Raichlen and UA psychologist Gene Alexander, who together run a research program on exercise and the brain, propose an “adaptive capacity model” for understanding, from…