An exploration of the perceived impact of COVID-19 on physical activity of Irish adolescents

Abstract

Background: Physical activity (PA) behaviours of adolescents were impacted by the stringent measures designed to prevent the spread of COVID-19, but little is known about the long-term impact of the pandemic on PA. Purpose: This study examines the perceived impact of COVID-19 on PA, the factors associated with these perceptions, and association with current PA behaviour. Methods: National representative sample from the island of Ireland completed the Children Sport Participation and Physical Activity (CSPPA) study in spring 2022. Questions included the ‘perceived impact of COVID-19 restrictions' dimensions of PA and PA participation. Rasch analyses were used to determine item validity. Logistic regressions were used to determine risk and protective factors in the perceived positive impact and associations between the impact of COVID-19 and PA. Results: The scale was deemed reliable (α = 0.86, p <.001) among the final sample of 12–20 year olds (weighted n = 2888). Perceived positive impact was lowest in school sport as PA levels increased and impact on fitness were highest among adolescents who were daily active (OR = 3.8, CI 2.7–5.3). Discussion: The pandemic had long lasting effects on adolescents’ PA and health. Ways to overcome the lack of school sport during the pandemic is needed at post-primary school level. Making changes to school sport may be protective over low PA levels when considering the return from the pandemic.

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Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, which permits any non-commercial use, sharing, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if you modified the licensed material. You do not have permission under this licence to share adapted material derived from this article or parts of it. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

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DOI

https://doi.org/10.1186/s12982-024-00351-2

Repository URI

https://www.research.ed.ac.uk/en/publications/d549c7c7-2ed1-443d-a2bc-5e0a7338b3a8