Overview
- The Keele University team led by Richard Stephens reports peer-reviewed results from nearly 200 participants published in American Psychologist.
- Short-term gains were recorded in simple tasks such as chair push-ups, handgrip strength and cycling speed.
- Participants repeating a chosen swear word outperformed neutral-word controls, with improvements up to about 10% on basic measures.
- In chair push-up trials, those who swore held the position longer, averaging about 2.5 seconds more.
- Self-reports showed greater focus and confidence, physiological data did not support an adrenaline explanation, and generalizability beyond lab tasks remains unclear.