ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½

Extroverts enjoy high-intensity with other people around - including team sports, say scientists.

But people with a neurotic personality prefer private workouts, according to the British study.

The findings, published in the , show that matching your workouts to your personality could make exercising more enjoyable and give better results.

Researchers from (UCL) examined how personality affects what types of exercise we prefer, and our commitment and engagement to them.

Study first author , of UCL's Institute of Sport, Exercise and Health, said: “We found that our personality can influence how we engage with exercise, and particularly which forms of exercise we enjoy the most."

Study senior author Prof. Paul Burgess, from UCL's Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, said: “Understanding personality factors in designing and recommending physical activity programs is likely to be very important in determining how successful a program is, and whether people will stick with it and become fitter.�

The UCL team recruited participants who attended lab testing to work out their fitness levels at the outset.

They then split the participants into two groups. The intervention group was provided with an eight-week home-based fitness plan made up of cycling and strength training, while the other group continued their usual lifestyle.

During lab testing, the first intervention week, and after the intervention, all the participants completed a questionnaire on how much they’d enjoyed each training session.

The personality traits examined as part of the study included extroversion, conscientiousness, agreeableness, neuroticism, and openness.

Dr. Ronca said: “Our brains are wired in different ways, which drives our behaviors and how we interact with our environment.

“So it’s not surprising that personality would also influence how we respond to different intensities of exercise.�

For instance, she said people scoring high on extroversion enjoyed high-intensity sessions with others around, including team sports.

But people scoring high on neuroticism preferred private workouts.

While they are fine with high intensity, they need short breaks in between.

Other people, scoring high on consciousness and openness, were found to engage in exercise regardless of whether they particularly enjoyed it or were driven by curiosity, respectively.

What the research team found particularly interesting was the relationship between personality, change in fitness, and stress.

Before the intervention, the stress levels of both groups were similar.

But after the intervention, especially people who scored high in neuroticism showed a "strong" reduction in stress.

Dr. Ronca said: “It’s fantastic news, as it highlights that those who benefit the most from a reduction in stress respond very well to exercise."

The research team pointed out that the most important part about exercising is finding something we enjoy and not to be discouraged if we don’t immediately find it.

Dr. Ronca said: “It’s okay if we don’t enjoy a particular session. We can try something else.�

Prof Burgess added: “We hope that if people can find physical activities that they enjoy they will more readily choose to do them.

“After all, we don’t have to nag dogs to go for a walk: being so physically inactive that we start to feel miserable might be a peculiarly human thing to do.

"In effect, our body punishes us by making us miserable.

"But for some reason, many of us humans seem poor at picking up on these messages it is sending to our brain.�