The Reciprocal Effects of Physical Activity and Happiness in Adolescents

Abstract

BackgroundPositive associations exist between physical activity and happiness in adolescents. However, previous studies have mostly used self-reported measures and cross-sectional designs. There is a need for more insight into the directionality and duration of this association. The current study was the first to investigate whether an increase in physical activity leads to happiness and whether adolescents become more physically active when they are happier. These two effects were studied between (on a day-to-day basis) and within days (on an hour-to-hour basis).MethodsThe study used data from the MyMovez project in which 1484 adolescents between the ages of 8 and 17 years wore an accelerometer on their wrist and answered experience sampling questions on happiness at random moments during the day for several weeks in 2016–2018.ResultsThe preregistered analyses demonstrated an association between physical activity and happiness. More specifically, the number of steps per day predicted the experienced happiness on that day. In addition, a short-term reciprocal effect of physical activity and happiness was observed. Happiness was predicted by the number of steps accumulated in the previous hour and it also predicted the number of steps accumulated in the subsequent hour. However, convincing evidence was found that these effects did not occur in the long-term between days. The number of steps on the previous day did not predict happiness, nor did happiness predict the number of steps of the subsequent day.ConclusionsThis study confirms an association between physical activity and happiness in adolescents and shows that in the short-term, physical activity promotes happiness and vice versa. Therefore, we conclude that physical activity is not only important for the physical health of youth, but also plays an important role in their mental well-being. In addition, this knowledge can be used to further understand the importance of physical activity in adolescents’ health and help in promoting a healthy lifestyle among youth.RegistrationThe data used are stored at the Data Archiving and Networked Services (https://doi.org/10.17026/dans-zz9-gn44). Hypotheses, study design, sample, data collection procedure, measured variables, and plan of analysis were preregistered on the Open Science Framework (OSF, https://osf.io/64gw5/?view_only=0c6894d63eeb4cb5aa01d91d87085c56 [blinded for peer review]).

Longitudinal associations between physical activity and mental health in adolescents

“…In addition, experimental studies in adolescents mostly observe benefits on mental health after applying a PA intervention (Hale et al, 2021). Moreover, according to a recent study with a day-by-day design (micro-longitudinal), it seems that the relationship could be even bidirectional, but only in the very short term (within the same day) (Van Woudenberg et al, 2020). Nevertheless, in the study authors considered only steps per day and happiness as a PA and psychological measures respectively.…”

Physical activity and the development of general mental health problems or attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptoms in children and adolescents: A cross-lagged panel analysis of long-term follow-up epidemiological data

“…Several longitudinal studies showed a long-term relationship between PA and psychological constructs, but the results are inconsistent (Wu et al, 2018 , 2021 ; Doré et al, 2019 , 2020 ; Kleppang et al, 2019 ; Loewen et al, 2019 ; Gómez-Baya et al, 2020 ; Hamer et al, 2020 ; Isaksson et al, 2020 ; Kandola et al, 2020 ; van Woudenberg et al, 2020 ; Bowe et al, 2021 ). To illustrate some results, Nigg et al concluded that PA may not be a preventive component for mental health problems, but mental health problems can be a risk factor for lower activity at preadolescent ages (Nigg et al, 2021 ).…”

“…Individual studies have small and non-representative samples (Ahn et al, 2018 ; Bowe et al, 2021 ; Mercurio et al, 2021 ), low quality, no long-term follow-ups, and inadequate consideration of real-world implementation factors for intervention studies (Parker et al, 2019 ). In many longitudinal studies, there is a lack of repeated measurements of either PA or mental health outcomes (Ahn et al, 2018 ; Peralta et al, 2018 ; Bell et al, 2019 ; Doré et al, 2019 , 2020 ; Kleppang et al, 2019 ; Hamer et al, 2020 ; Pagani et al, 2020 ; van Woudenberg et al, 2020 ; Bowe et al, 2021 ; Wu et al, 2021 ). Also, a focus on specific mental health outcomes (Rodriguez-Ayllon et al, 2019 ) and less frequent use of multidimensional measurements (Bell et al, 2019 ) are further limitations that should be mentioned.…”