State anxiety and ambulatory blood pressure following resistance exercise in females.

The purpose of this investigation was to examine state anxiety and blood pressure responses during ambulatory recovery from resistance exercise. Fourteen females completed three separate bouts of resistance exercise in which the sets (N = 3), repetitions (N = 10), exercise type (knee extension, knee flexion, arm pull down, chest press, shoulder press, and abdominal curl), and time (30 min) were held constant, but the intensity was manipulated to equal 40%, 60%, and 80% of the 10-repetition maximum for each exercise. Immediately before as well as 1, 15, 30, 45, 60, 75, 90, 105, and 120 min following the cessation of exercise blood pressure and heart rate were assessed. State anxiety assessments were initiated immediately following blood pressure measurements. The subjects were ambulatory during the post-exercise period, and information about body posture during the cardiovascular assessments was obtained. MANOVAs, ANOVAs, and Tukey tests revealed that post-exercise state anxiety levels were reduced compared with pre-exercise values from 90 to 120 min following exercise. Systolic blood pressure was elevated at 1 and 15 min following the 80% intensity condition, and at 1 min following the 60% intensity condition. It is concluded that during ambulatory recovery from resistance exercise: 1) reductions in state anxiety are realized; and 2) systolic blood pressure, in contrast to what has been shown to occur following aerobic exercise, is not reduced.