Cargando…

“No Pain No Gain”: Evidence from a Parcel-Wise Brain Morphometry Study on the Volitional Quality of Elite Athletes

Volition is described as a psychological construct with great emphasis on the sense of agency. During volitional behavior, an individual always presents a volitional quality, an intrapersonal trait for dealing with adverse circumstances, which determines the individual’s persistence of action toward...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Wei, Gaoxia, Si, Ruoguang, Li, Youfa, Yao, Ying, Chen, Lizhen, Zhang, Shu, Huang, Tao, Zou, Liye, Li, Chunxiao, Perrey, Stephane
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7407584/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32709011
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/brainsci10070459
_version_ 1783567656530477056
author Wei, Gaoxia
Si, Ruoguang
Li, Youfa
Yao, Ying
Chen, Lizhen
Zhang, Shu
Huang, Tao
Zou, Liye
Li, Chunxiao
Perrey, Stephane
author_facet Wei, Gaoxia
Si, Ruoguang
Li, Youfa
Yao, Ying
Chen, Lizhen
Zhang, Shu
Huang, Tao
Zou, Liye
Li, Chunxiao
Perrey, Stephane
author_sort Wei, Gaoxia
collection PubMed
description Volition is described as a psychological construct with great emphasis on the sense of agency. During volitional behavior, an individual always presents a volitional quality, an intrapersonal trait for dealing with adverse circumstances, which determines the individual’s persistence of action toward their intentions or goals. Elite athletes are a group of experts with superior volitional quality and, thereby, could be regarded as the natural subject pool to investigate this mental trait. The purpose of this study was to examine brain morphometric characteristics associated with volitional quality by using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and the Scale of Volitional Quality. We recruited 16 national-level athletes engaged in short track speed skating and 18 healthy controls matched with age and gender. A comparison of a parcel-wise brain anatomical characteristics of the healthy controls with those of the elite athletes revealed three regions with significantly increased cortical thickness in the athlete group. These regions included the left precuneus, the left inferior parietal lobe, and the right superior frontal lobe, which are the core brain regions involved in the sense of agency. The mean cortical thickness of the left inferior parietal lobe was significantly correlated with the independence of volitional quality (a mental trait that characterizes one’s intendency to control his/her own behavior and make decisions by applying internal standards and/or objective criteria). These findings suggest that sports training is an ideal model for better understanding the neural mechanisms of volitional behavior in the human brain.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-7407584
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2020
publisher MDPI
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-74075842020-08-25 “No Pain No Gain”: Evidence from a Parcel-Wise Brain Morphometry Study on the Volitional Quality of Elite Athletes Wei, Gaoxia Si, Ruoguang Li, Youfa Yao, Ying Chen, Lizhen Zhang, Shu Huang, Tao Zou, Liye Li, Chunxiao Perrey, Stephane Brain Sci Article Volition is described as a psychological construct with great emphasis on the sense of agency. During volitional behavior, an individual always presents a volitional quality, an intrapersonal trait for dealing with adverse circumstances, which determines the individual’s persistence of action toward their intentions or goals. Elite athletes are a group of experts with superior volitional quality and, thereby, could be regarded as the natural subject pool to investigate this mental trait. The purpose of this study was to examine brain morphometric characteristics associated with volitional quality by using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and the Scale of Volitional Quality. We recruited 16 national-level athletes engaged in short track speed skating and 18 healthy controls matched with age and gender. A comparison of a parcel-wise brain anatomical characteristics of the healthy controls with those of the elite athletes revealed three regions with significantly increased cortical thickness in the athlete group. These regions included the left precuneus, the left inferior parietal lobe, and the right superior frontal lobe, which are the core brain regions involved in the sense of agency. The mean cortical thickness of the left inferior parietal lobe was significantly correlated with the independence of volitional quality (a mental trait that characterizes one’s intendency to control his/her own behavior and make decisions by applying internal standards and/or objective criteria). These findings suggest that sports training is an ideal model for better understanding the neural mechanisms of volitional behavior in the human brain. MDPI 2020-07-17 /pmc/articles/PMC7407584/ /pubmed/32709011 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/brainsci10070459 Text en © 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Wei, Gaoxia
Si, Ruoguang
Li, Youfa
Yao, Ying
Chen, Lizhen
Zhang, Shu
Huang, Tao
Zou, Liye
Li, Chunxiao
Perrey, Stephane
“No Pain No Gain”: Evidence from a Parcel-Wise Brain Morphometry Study on the Volitional Quality of Elite Athletes
title “No Pain No Gain”: Evidence from a Parcel-Wise Brain Morphometry Study on the Volitional Quality of Elite Athletes
title_full “No Pain No Gain”: Evidence from a Parcel-Wise Brain Morphometry Study on the Volitional Quality of Elite Athletes
title_fullStr “No Pain No Gain”: Evidence from a Parcel-Wise Brain Morphometry Study on the Volitional Quality of Elite Athletes
title_full_unstemmed “No Pain No Gain”: Evidence from a Parcel-Wise Brain Morphometry Study on the Volitional Quality of Elite Athletes
title_short “No Pain No Gain”: Evidence from a Parcel-Wise Brain Morphometry Study on the Volitional Quality of Elite Athletes
title_sort “no pain no gain”: evidence from a parcel-wise brain morphometry study on the volitional quality of elite athletes
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7407584/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32709011
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/brainsci10070459
work_keys_str_mv AT weigaoxia nopainnogainevidencefromaparcelwisebrainmorphometrystudyonthevolitionalqualityofeliteathletes
AT siruoguang nopainnogainevidencefromaparcelwisebrainmorphometrystudyonthevolitionalqualityofeliteathletes
AT liyoufa nopainnogainevidencefromaparcelwisebrainmorphometrystudyonthevolitionalqualityofeliteathletes
AT yaoying nopainnogainevidencefromaparcelwisebrainmorphometrystudyonthevolitionalqualityofeliteathletes
AT chenlizhen nopainnogainevidencefromaparcelwisebrainmorphometrystudyonthevolitionalqualityofeliteathletes
AT zhangshu nopainnogainevidencefromaparcelwisebrainmorphometrystudyonthevolitionalqualityofeliteathletes
AT huangtao nopainnogainevidencefromaparcelwisebrainmorphometrystudyonthevolitionalqualityofeliteathletes
AT zouliye nopainnogainevidencefromaparcelwisebrainmorphometrystudyonthevolitionalqualityofeliteathletes
AT lichunxiao nopainnogainevidencefromaparcelwisebrainmorphometrystudyonthevolitionalqualityofeliteathletes
AT perreystephane nopainnogainevidencefromaparcelwisebrainmorphometrystudyonthevolitionalqualityofeliteathletes