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Soccer Heading, Not Collisions, Causes Temporary Thinking Declines: Study

Soccer Heading, Not Collisions, Causes Temporary Thinking Declines: Study
A new study showed heading a soccer ball led to more significant temporary thinking declines than collisions with other players. (Olezzo/Dreamstime.com)

By    |   Tuesday, 24 April 2018 05:07 PM EDT

Soccer heading, rather than collisions with other players, has been found to cause temporary thinking declines in players in a new study. 

The study by the Albert Einstein College of Medicine has found that soccer players who intentionally head the ball often have larger declines in cognitive function than those who collide with another player, even when the collision leads to concussion symptoms.

Although previous studies have shown that heading the ball can cause concussion symptoms and temporary declines in cognitive function, it was the first study to compare the effects of heading with those of collisions.

“We showed in a previous study that frequent heading is an underappreciated cause of concussion symptoms,” study author and Einstein professor Dr. Michael Lipton said. “And now we’ve found that heading appears to alter cognitive [thinking] function as well, at least temporarily.”

The study, done with 300 amateur soccer players in New York City, was not designed to prove that heading causes thinking problems, the Einstein site said. Players who headed the ball the most, however, did the worst on tests of attention and reaction time, even considering the approximately one-third whose heads collided with another player's head or foot, or a goalpost. They also did slightly worse on a working memory test. 

The effects of the soccer ball heading were not severe, but study authors fear that even temporary declines could lead to changes in the structure of the brain and more persistent impairments, Health Day reported.

“We need a much longer-term follow-up study of more soccer players to fully address this question,” Lipton said, suggesting that players try to head the ball less during practices and games, Health Day reported. 

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TheWire
Soccer heading, rather than collisions with other players, has been found to cause temporary thinking declines in players in a new study.
soccer, heading, collisions, thinking, declines, study
280
2018-07-24
Tuesday, 24 April 2018 05:07 PM
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