An OU professor studies how imagining exercises and motions can help prevent muscle loss.
A professor in Ohio University’s Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine plans to use a $1.4 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to study the brain’s effect on muscle loss in those over 65 years old.
Brian Clark, a professor of neuromuscular biology and director of OU’s Musculoskeletal and Neurological Institute, will investigate how viewing images and videos of exercise can help keep muscles from losing their strength when a person doesn’t have the ability to exercise.
Clark’s study is based on a concept called mental imagery, which is the idea that a person’s brain can react similarly when actually experiencing something and when just looking at images. In his case, the brain may have similar reactions to exercising and simply viewing the motions.
The study will run for four years and will begin the early phases throughout spring semester.
“I will mainly be investigating the effects of mental imagery on the brains of older people because they are less able to do certain activities,” he said. “Most people think that muscle loss is largely to do with muscle size, but that is far from explaining all of it.”
Clark said he drew inspiration from researchers who began studying mental imagery in the 1990s.
“Mental imagery is actually a visualization process that most people deal with on a daily basis and are subconsciously familiar with,” Clark said. “For example, it can be when you are going to talk in front of a group of people, and you imagine what you’re going to say before you actually give the speech.”
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