The Claim

In healthy adult men, the magnitude of the salivary cortisol response to a single session of sprint interval exercise (5 × 10-s all-out efforts with 50-s recovery) is significantly greater in untrained individuals compared to strength-trained individuals, while endurance-trained individuals do not exhibit a significantly different response relative to either untrained or strength-trained groups.

Source: Effects of Dominance and Sprint Interval Exercise on Testosterone and Cortisol Levels in Strength-, Endurance-, and Non-Training Men

What the research says

Supports is higher

Support is ahead, but a single strong opposing study can change this.

Supports
44score
Challenges
0score

These are independent scores, not a percentage. Higher-grade studies count more, so a single strong opposing study can outweigh several weaker ones.

Description
1 study reviewed
In plain English

Healthy men who don't exercise regularly get a bigger spike in a stress hormone (cortisol) after a short burst of intense exercise than men who lift weights regularly. Men who are endurance athletes (like runners) are in between—their spike isn't clearly different from either of the other groups.

See the scientific wording

Among healthy adult men, the cortisol response to a single session of sprint interval exercise (5 × 10-s all-out with 50-s recovery) varies by training background: non-trained men exhibit a significantly larger increase in salivary cortisol compared to strength-trained men, while endurance-trained men do not differ significantly from either group.

Why this might work

When you sprint all-out, your body produces a stress hormone called cortisol. People who don't train often produce a lot of cortisol. People who lift weights produce less, because their bodies are used to that kind of hard effort. Runners and cyclists produce an amount that is not clearly different from either group.

Hypothetical mechanismbased on 1 study

What the research says

1 study
  1. Study: Effects of Dominance and Sprint Interval Exercise on Testosterone and Cortisol Levels in Strength-, Endurance-, and Non-Training Men

    The study showed that men who don't train and men who lift weights had different changes in a stress hormone after a short, hard workout, but men who run or cycle didn't show those differences. It didn't say which group had the bigger change, but it shows training background matters.

Score breakdown, mechanism chain, raw evidence, ideal studies needed & 1 supporting studies

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