When It HIITs, You Feel No Pain: Psychological and Psychophysiological Effects of Respite–Active Music in High-Intensity Interval Training

AbstractThe authors investigated the effects of respite–active music (i.e., music used for active recovery in between high-intensity exercise bouts) on psychological and psychophysiological outcomes. Participants (N = 24) made four laboratory visits for a habituation, medium- and fast-tempo music conditions, and a no-music control. A high-intensity interval-training protocol comprising 8 × 60-s exercise bouts at 100% Wmax with 90-s active recovery was administered. Measures were taken at the end of exercise bouts and recovery periods (rating of perceived exertion [RPE], state attention, and core affect) and then upon cessation of the protocol (enjoyment and remembered pleasure). Heart rate was measured throughout. Medium-tempo music enhanced affective valence during exercise and recovery, while both music conditions increased dissociation (only during recovery), enjoyment, and remembered pleasure relative to control. Medium-tempo music lowered RPE relative to control, but the heart rate results were inconclusive. As predicted, medium-tempo music, in particular, had a meaningful effect on a range of psychological outcomes.Detailed Description of Data File This SPSS data file contains the demographic data (i.e. sex [1 = men, 2 = women], height [cm], weight [kg], BMI, average weekly moderate and vigorous physical activity [hours]) for each of the 23 participants (presented with one participant on each row). Note that one participant was deleted due to multiple univariate outliers (k = 45). The WattMax value from the baseline ramped protocol is included thereafter. Each participant was exposed to three conditions: a) no-music control; b) medium-tempo music (120–125 bpm); and c) fast-tempo music (135–140 bpm). Accordingly, the first block of data columns pertain to control (“CI” for interval and “CR” for recovery), the second block of data columns pertain to medium-tempo music (“MI” for interval and “MR” for recovery), and the third block of data columns pertain to fast-tempo music (“FI” for interval and “FR” for recovery). For each individual stage (interval and recovery) of the HIIT bout, RPE CR10 scores, state attention scores (Tammen, 1996), affective valence scores (Feeling Scale) and arousal scores (Felt Arousal Scale) are listed. These scores are followed by HR measures (peak and average for intervals, low and average for recovery periods). At the end of each condition, participants provided scores for remembered pleasure (200-point scale) and exercise enjoyment (PACES; total scores). Post-experiment scores of music liking for each track and condition appear thereafter. Note, for the measures taken during each HIIT bout, an average score across the entire trial is then included, followed by the same metrics divided into the average for part 1 (interval 1–recovery 4) and part 2 (interval 5–recovery 8). Finally, z-scores (i.e. standardised scores) for each of the aforementioned measures are included on the far right of the data file.