A research study led by Aron Barbey from the University of Illinois, the United States of America, aimed to establish whether physical and /or cognitive interventions would enhance judgement and decision making. 

160 healthy people participated in a 16-week randomised controlled trial and were separated into four groups. Each group engaged in one of four interventions: physical fitness training; physical fitness training and cognitive training of core executive functions; physical fitness training and cognitive training combined with mindfulness meditation training; or, active control training.

The researchers predicted improved executive functions would result from the intervention, allowing participants to overcome established biases in decision making. The results of the experiment found a multi-disciplinary approach (a combination of psychology and cognitive neuroscience interventions) benefited the judgement and decision making of study participants during real world scenarios. 

The study is one of the largest and most comprehensive multi-modal intervention trials ever conducted and to learn more about this research work, please follow the link to Enhanced decision-making through multimodal training, published by npj Science of Learning Journal.

Reference

Zwilling, C.E., Daugherty, A.M., Hillman, C.H. et al. Enhanced decision-making through multimodal training. npj Sci. Learn. 4, 11 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41539-019-0049-x