This seems reasonable and might be true, but they didn't study how often people exercise. They had study participants wear accelerometers and tracked their tota

This seems reasonable and might be true, but they didn't study how often people exercise. They had study participants wear accelerometers and tracked their total physical activity during waking hours. What they found was that people with a high need for cognition were less active overall, including when not exercising. I think at least part of what they are observing is that people tend to sit still while thinking, so if you think a lot you spend more time being sedentary. In the full paper there is also an interesting conjecture that high NFC people may enjoy exercise less because they are more sensitive to the physical discomfort it causes. That one seems reasonable to me too but it is just a conjecture. I suspect I'm high NFC and that's why I enjoy sitting and reading and programming like a thoughtful lump, and spend most of my time doing these things. But it's not good for health, so what's a high NFC person supposed to do, schedule in time doing things they don't enjoy? Or can they somehow reframe low cognition activities as enjoyable? Or can they add cognition to activities that normally don't require it, or combine them with high cognition activities? (E.g. using a treadmill desk while you work, or listening to podcasts while you jog)