The Hour Between Dog and Wolf: How Risk Taking Transforms Us, Body and Mind

by John Coates

A well-designed regime of physical exercise can be a boot camp for the brain. In the future, however, the advice to exercise, administered so liberally by doctors everywhere, could be made more effective by being more explicit. What type of exercise? Anabolic or anaerobic? How often? Once again, sports science could help enormously in tailoring this advice to the person receiving it. One type of toughening regime is especially intriguing, and that is exposure to cold weather, even to cold water. Scientists have found that rats swimming regularly in cold water develop the capacity to mount a quick and powerful arousal, relying on adrenaline more than cortisol, and to switch it off just as quickly. When subsequently exposed to stressors they are not as prone to learned helplessness. Some tentative research has suggested that much the same thing occurs in humans. People who are regularly exposed to cold weather or who swim in cool water may have undergone an effective toughening regime that has made them more emotionally stable when confronted by prolonged stress. It is surmised by some researchers that the exercise itself, coupled with acute thermal demands, provides these people with an enviable pattern of stress and recovery. Perhaps the same effects could result from the Nordic practice of a sauna followed by a cold plunge.