Taking twelve slow breaths enhances cardiovascular and cognitive plasticity in young and older adults

Slow controlled breathing is an ancient practice for mental and physiological calm and is often distilled in the present-day advice to ‘take a deep breath.’ However, the effects of slow breathing on cognition and its underlying mechanisms are unknown. Here we examined the capacity for brief slow breathing (6 breaths per minute) to engage the vagal nerve and enhance learning and cognitive plasticity across the lifespan. Two minutes of slow breathing increased vagal regulation of the heart, enhancing variability in beat-to-beat cardiovascular dynamics. Following slow breathing, vagal modulation transferred to cognitive performance, enhancing stimulus-response (S-R) learning and then adaptive re-learning when S-R contingencies changed. These effects were particularly potent with increasing age, resulting in performance equal to participants over forty years younger. Taking twelve slow deep breaths has short-term benefits for cardiovascular and cognitive plasticity, hypothetically via vagally-mediated brainstem modulation of the heart and the brain, rejuvenating functions altered by aging.