Shannon Gu

PSYCH 202 AB
5/2/19
QS5 Homework

1. Give the citation for the article, in APA format. [Authors (year of publication) Name
of the article, Source name, URL (if applicable).]

Reynolds, G. (2019, May 1). How Exercise Affects Our Memory. The New York Times.
Retrieved May 2, 2019, from https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/01/well/move/how-
exercise-affects-our-memory.html

2. Who wrote the article? Does the article give any information about the author's
credentials? What additional information can you find about the author on the
internet? Given all of this information, what can you, the reader, conclude about the
author's point of view and possible motivation for writing this article?

The author is Gretchen Reynolds. The article doesn’t provide any information about her
credentials, but her biography page states that she is a columnist for the New York Times
who writes about exercise and wellness. She studied English in college and has been a
journalist for almost 20 years. Her interests lie in scientific communication, and she has
won awards for her work from both journalism organizations and medical organizations.
Given this information, her main motivation for writing this article is most likely that she
is personally interested in the topic and wants to make current research about exercise more
accessible to a general audience.

3. Who published the article (what website/magazine/newspaper)? Is this a credible

source or not? How can you tell? Using the internet, can you find out who owns this
source? If so, what can you find out about this person or group? What is their
agenda? Why might this source have published this specific article?

The article was published by the New York Times, which is a credible source; it is the most
renowned newspaper in the U.S. and has won over 100 Pulitzer Prizes. The newspaper is
owned by the mass media company The New York Times Company, and its mission is to
“seek the truth and help people understand the world,” as seen on its website
(www.nytco.com/). Based on its mission statement, the New York Times would have
published this specific article to inform people about the intersection between science and
wellness, which is often misunderstood or misinterpreted.

4. Who is the intended audience for this article? What assumptions are made by the
author and the source about this audience?

The intended audience is anyone interested in health and wellness. The author and the
source assumes that the audience has at least a basic knowledge of biology.

5. What conclusions about behavioral neuroscience are presented in the article?

 Short-term exercise can activate semantic memory.

6. What information is given to support these conclusions? Is a scientific study

described? Can you tell how it was conducted, who the subjects were, and what
results the study found? If the article quotes an "expert," does it give that person's
qualifications (and should we trust them)?

The author describes a scientific study in which 26 healthy men and women ages 55-85
were divided into two groups: a control group, which rested for 30 minutes, and an
experimental group, which exercised for 30 minutes on an exercise bike. After the 30-
minute period, both groups had to correctly distinguish between the names of famous
people—a measurement of semantic memory—and the names of non-famous people while
their brains were scanned using MRI. The results showed that the experimental group had
greater activity in the brain regions involved in semantic memory compared to the control
group.

The article quotes J. Carson Smith, who supervised the study and is the director of the
Exercise for Brain Health Laboratory at the University of Maryland. While he is very
qualified to talk about the study, it would have been more convincing to quote experts who
were not involved in the study.

7. Does the article present thorough details about the evidence supporting its claims, or
does it omit relevant information? What else could you ask about the study? Are
multiple interpretations of a study's results presented? Are alternate explanations
for the findings presented?

The article uses the study itself as its main evidence for supporting its claims, and it
discusses previous research on how exercise changes the brain. It also compares the recent
study with a previous study about how long-term exercise affects the brain regions
associated with semantic memory. The article does present enough detail to argue that
exercise changes the brain, and does not omit relevant information.

I would ask whether or not the researchers have done a similar study in young adults, and
whether or not the results of this study would hold up for younger individuals.

Multiple interpretations of the study’s results and alternate explanations are not presented.

8. Does the article speak in definitive terms such as “prove”? If so, why do you think it
does this? Does the article acknowledge that more/different research may contribute
a different interpretation or explanation? In a brief internet search using Google
Scholar, can you find articles that appear to either support or contradict (or both) the
conclusions of this article?

The article does not speak in definitive terms. It acknowledges that the study only addresses
the effects of short-term exercise and does not examine how these effects change when
short-term exercise becomes long-term, and that the study does not offer explanations for
 the mechanism behind the changes in the brain. Many review articles on exercise and the
brain support the conclusion that exercise can improve the brain’s health and cognitive
processes.

9. Does the article utilize emotional reasoning? That is, does it create a strong emotional
response in the reader? If so, how does it do this (hint: examine the language used!)
and why? How do the author and source's agendas influence this? How do the
reader's (your) own biases influence this?

The article uses emotional reasoning in the introduction and conclusion of the article. In
the introduction, it describes the study as “promising” and directly addresses the audience
by saying how exercise can “lead to long-term improvements in how our brains operate
and we remember” (emphasis mine) (Reynolds, 2019). It draws the audience in by stating
how this research is relevant to them and how it could improve their lives. The article
concludes by stating how exercise can “help us maintain our memories of that genial
Beatles drummer and all the other touchstones of our pasts” (Reynolds, 2019), which is an
emotional appeal to nostalgia to make readers think seriously about the implications of the
research.

Given that the author is a regular columnist on exercise and wellness, it makes sense that
she would promote research that supports the benefits of exercise for the brain. As a reader,
because of the emotional appeals, I am inclined to be more invested in the research because
it could benefit me personally.