Physical activity is frequently considered beneficial for mental health. In particular, there is evidence that supports that physical activity is associated with less depression, anxiety and fatigue. These are therefore reasons for healthcare professionals to advise people to stay or become more physically active. However, little is known about the influence that the settings and the experience surrounding the activity (i.e. the how, where and why) have on the mental health outcomes. In a recent study published in the journal of Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise (American College of Sports Medicine), a team of researchers, including Dr Patrick O’Connor as a co-author (Mary Frances Early College of Education’s Department of Kinesiology, University of Georgia), suggests that the influence physical activity has on mental health does not only depend on the amount of exercise (i.e. dose and calories burned) but on the how, where and why someone exercises. According to the authors, the amount of exercise has been the way research has tried to understand the association between physical activity and mental health, and how the former influences the latter. To analyse this association in detail, the team of researchers reviewed three types of studies.
These included epidemiological studies (which examined health patterns in populations), randomised clinical studies (where some groups of people received exercise treatments while others did not), and a set of investigations studying contextual factors surrounding the physical activity. Based on the evidence and findings from epidemiological and randomised clinical studies, physical activity is associated with better mental health, including reduced levels of depression and anxiety. It seems, therefore, that the adoption of leisure-time physical activity, at any starting level, correlates with better mental health outcomes. However, the importance of the context and how this can make the same physical activity feel very different depending on who the activity was done with, where, when and how are less clear in the literature. Context, the team of researchers explained, can range from peer dynamics to the instructor or even to the weather conditions (when the activity is happening outdoors) and the time of the day. For example, having an instructor that you like or don’t like when taking a group exercise class may determine the impact that the exercise will have on your mental health. Abusive sport coaches, for example, are another contextual factor that will harm the mental health of those exercising in such conditions.
Although there is need for research on this topic, it is clear, for the authors, that mental health outcomes derived from physical activity are not only about the frequency, the intensity, and the duration of such activity. It is the whole experience around that activity; i.e. who we exercise with, whether we have fun, whether we are cheered or booed and whether we leave the experience feeling proud and accepted, or not, that determines the impact of the physical activity on the individual’s mental health. Authors remind us that physical activity always occurs within a context (i.e. at some time, in some place and alone or with other people). It is therefore important that, if healthcare professionals want to help people’s mental health with exercise, they don’t forget that the meaning, the settings and the experience matter too.