We wanted to believe that exercise could prevent depression. Our studies have found that exercise helps prevent depression. The Hopkins findings were surprising to them and us. A positive effect of exercise in preventing depression is fairly well accepted and has been shown in many studies. The fact that the Hopkins group's well-done study found no benefit makes one wonder whether it was due to the fact that the group was entirely composed of male physicians.
Females report depression much more often than men.
Our research, published in the International Journal of Obesity , was based on a cohort from the Reno Diet Heart Study. It looked at cardiovascular risk from 1985 through 1996 in a healthy population. We found that people who exercise have less depression than people who don't. The more exercise, we found, the greater the feeling of well-being. No one in the group studied was clinically depressed.