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present study investigated the influence of personality on exercise-induced
mood changes. It was hypothesised that (a) exercise would be associated
with significant mood enhancement across all personality types, (b)
extroversion would be associated with positive mood and neuroticism
with negative mood both pre- and post-exercise, and (c) personality
measures would interact with exercise-induced mood changes. Participants
were 90 female exercisers (M = 25.8 yr, SD = 9.0 yr) who completed
the Eysenck Personality Inventory (EPI) once and the Brunel Mood Scale
(BRUMS) before and after a 60-minute exercise session. Median splits
were used to group participants into four personality types: stable
introverts (n = 25), stable extroverts (n = 20), neurotic introverts
(n = 26), and neurotic extroverts (n = 19). Repeated measures MANOVA
showed significant mood enhancement following exercise across all
personality types. Neuroticism was associated with negative mood scores
pre- and post-exercise but the effect of extroversion on reported
mood was relatively weak. There was no significant interaction effect
between exercise-induced mood enhancement and personality. In conclusion,
findings lend support to the notion that exercise is associated with
improved mood. However, findings show that personality did not influence
this effect, although neuroticism was associated with negative mood.
KEY
WORDS: Mood, exercise, personality, mental health, POMS, BRUMS,
EPI.
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