Adolescent Sport Participation and Symptoms of Anxiety and Depression: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

“The Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale (Radloff, 1977) was the most common measure; being included in 10 studies.”

“Whereas it is important to consider that adolescent females have a higher prevalence of anxiety symptoms than males (Merikangas et al., 2010), this significant moderation provides early stage evidence that sport involvement may have unique benefits for adolescent males.”

“Considering the prevalence of mental disorders, it is vital to identify activities, interventions, and policies that support adolescent mental health (Patel et al., 2007).”

“As one example, social support plays a stress-buffering role by reducing cardiovascular reactivity to stress (Uchino, 2006).”

“While positive youth development models emphasize a strength-based approach (e.g., Larson, 2000), it is important for youth sport researchers to remember that focusing on strengths does not mean disregarding adversity faced by youth or harm-reduction initiatives.”

“Along with evidence that symptoms of mental disorders affect 10–20% of adolescents during a given year, researchers have demonstrated that mental disorders account for 15–30% of disability-adjusted life years lost during the first 30 years of life (Kieling et al., 2011).”

“Researchers tend to align theoretically with expectations that sport delivers opportunities for physical activity and social interactions that, independently, are protective factors (e.g., Eime et al., 2013; Fraser-Thomas et al., 2005; Paluska & Schwenk, 2000).”

“Researchers tend to align theoretically with expectations that sport delivers opportunities for physical activity and social interactions that, independently, are protective factors (e.g., Eime et al., 2013; Fraser-Thomas et al., 2005; Paluska & Schwenk, 2000).”

“Nevertheless, Biddle et al. (2018) reported that anxiety symptoms were rarely the focus of recent studies and that evidence was mixed regarding the magnitude of the inverse relationship between anxiety symptoms and physical activity.”

“, diet, sleep, and lifestyle choices) or may develop self-regulation skills for managing daily stressors (Fraser-Thomas et al., 2005).”

“Applying this perspective, adolescents who are mentally healthy possess cognitive and social skills that are typical for their development, along with abilities related to emotional regulation, empathy, stress management, and engagement in social roles (Galderisi et al., 2015).”

“The random-effects modeling is recommended by Schmidt, Oh, and Hayes (2009) as it is conservative in nature, providing more accurate results.”

“Meanwhile, anxiety scales included the Zung Self-Rating Anxiety Scale (used by McMahon et al., 2017), Hospital Anxiety and Depressive Scale (used by Doré et al., 2018), and State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (used by Dolenc, 2015).”

“Slater and Tiggemann (2011) also found that adolescent females experience more adverse social experiences in sport, which could hinder potential protective effects on mental health.”

“Further aligning with the psychosocial path, sport may satisfy the need to belong and expose adolescents to group memberships that are critical for wellbeing (e.g., Cruwys et al., 2013).”

“Research spanning decades provides evidence that self-reported anxiety and depression symptoms are lower in adolescents who engage in greater daily physical activity or who participate in physical activity interventions (Ahn & Fedewa, 2011).”

“Although definitions vary, we focused on adolescence as a period from 12 to 18 years of age that represents critical developmental transitions (Jaworska & MacQueen, 2015).”

“Researchers have made numerous calls to integrate disparate lines of investigation regarding extracurricular activities (Fredricks & Eccles, 2006), but our review only located five studies that contrasted sport participation to other forms of participation in relation to anxiety and depression…”

“We selected symptoms of anxiety and depression as critical outcomes to examine, considering the strong relations between them (Kessler, Berglund, & Demler, 2003) and because of the impact on other dimensions of health such as life satisfaction (Headey, Kelley, & Wearing, 1993) and physical health–related quality of li…”

“Several studies used existing data sets, such as the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (United States; Babiss & Gangwisch, 2009), the Nicotine Dependence in Teens Study (Canada; Sabiston et al., 2016), or the Healthy Neighborhoods Study (Australia; Kremer et al., 2014).”

“Effect sizes were quantitatively synthesized using meta-analytic methods developed by Schmidt and Hunter (2014) using the psychmeta package in R (Dahlke & Wiernik, 2019).”

“, 2016) drew data from theNicotine Dependence in Teens Study and two studies (i.e., Agans & Geldhof, 2012; Zarrett et al., 2009) drew data from the 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development.”

“In studies examining relationships with anxiety or depression symptoms, measures of sport participation range from whether adolescents report being involved or not (e.g., Jewett et al., 2014) to the amount of sport involvement (e.g., hours per week; Wang, Chow, & Amemiya, 2017).”

“Additional validated depression tools included the Major Depressive Inventory (used by Brunet et al., 2013) and the Beck Depression Inventory (used by Boone & Leadbeater, 2006).”

“…is based on the developmental systems theories that recognize the interrelatedness of influences contributing to both strengths and challenges (Masten, 2014), highlighting the need for research that focuses on positive developmental outcomes of sport alongside the potential to reduce symptoms…”

“During the crucial developmental period of adolescence, symptoms of both anxiety and depression are widespread (Teubert & Pinquart, 2011).”

“As examples, four studies (i.e., Ashdown-Frank, Sabiston, Solomon-Krakus, & O’Loughlin, 2017; Brunet et al., 2013; Jewett et al., 2014; Sabiston et al., 2016) drew data from theNicotine Dependence in Teens Study and two studies (i.e., Agans & Geldhof, 2012; Zarrett et al., 2009) drew data from the…”

“For example, the personal assets framework (Côté et al., 2014) describes how optimal sport activities, environments, and relationships foster developmental assets like perceptions of connection, character, confidence, and competence.”

“For instance, a scale distinguishing time spent in sport as “no sport participation,” “weekly participation,” or “more-than-weekly participation” (e.g., Brière et al., 2018) would presumably hold a relationship that differs in slope and composition from a scale measuring hours involved per week…”

“One further possibility is that sport may have a strong benefit for many, but also a detrimental effect for others who experience ostracism from peers or other detrimental social or physical experiences (e.g., MacDonald et al., 2012).”

“As examples, four studies (i.e., Ashdown-Frank, Sabiston, Solomon-Krakus, & O’Loughlin, 2017; Brunet et al., 2013; Jewett et al., 2014; Sabiston et al., 2016) drew data from theNicotine Dependence in Teens Study and two studies (i.e., Agans & Geldhof, 2012; Zarrett et al., 2009) drew data from the…”

“Meanwhile, anxiety scales included the Zung Self-Rating Anxiety Scale (used by McMahon et al., 2017), Hospital Anxiety and Depressive Scale (used by Doré et al., 2018), and State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (used by Dolenc, 2015).”

“; Fatiregun & Kumapayi, 2014), (b) may be challenging to respond to (e.g., “indicate the number of sports teams on which you participated in the past year”; Duncan et al., 2015), or (c) entail researcher-imposed categories that may not fully represent the contexts involved (e.g., classifying sports…”

“In addition, some investigations (e.g., Ashdown-Franks et al., 2017; Sabiston et al., 2016) contrasted team and individual sport participation as a proxy for social interaction, finding early evidence that depressive symptoms were less frequent for adolescents involved in team sport.”

“…examples, four studies (i.e., Ashdown-Frank, Sabiston, Solomon-Krakus, & O’Loughlin, 2017; Brunet et al., 2013; Jewett et al., 2014; Sabiston et al., 2016) drew data from theNicotine Dependence in Teens Study and two studies (i.e., Agans & Geldhof, 2012; Zarrett et al., 2009) drew data from the 4-”

“It may be of special interest to use a positive mental health indicator as the dependent variable such as subjective well-being (e.g., Merglen et al., 2014).”

“Meanwhile, anxiety scales included the Zung Self-Rating Anxiety Scale (used by McMahon et al., 2017), Hospital Anxiety and Depressive Scale (used by Doré et al., 2018), and State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (used by Dolenc, 2015).”

“For example, a meta-analysis by Graupensperger, Jensen, and Evans (2018) examined variability in effect sizes by the age of athlete samples to identify potential patterns in effects related to age— revealing moderation effects that had not been tested in the original studies.”

“…time spent in sport as “no sport participation,” “weekly participation,” or “more-than-weekly participation” (e.g., Brière et al., 2018) would presumably hold a relationship that differs in slope and composition from a scale measuring hours involved per week (e.g., Wang et al., 2017).”

“…& Kumapayi, 2014), (b) may be challenging to respond to (e.g., “indicate the number of sports teams on which you participated in the past year”; Duncan et al., 2015), or (c) entail researcher-imposed categories that may not fully represent the contexts involved (e.g., classifying sports as…”

“One factor that may protect against the development of mental health difficulties is participation in organized youth sport [3,4].”

“Altogether, there is mounting evidence that sport participation is associated with mental health among youth (see review Panza et al., 2020), and this should be of primary focus for researchers in recreational sport domains (Vella & Swann, 2020).”

“These findings are consistent with previous systematic reviews, such as those by Biddle and Panza, which reported that physical activity interventions can reduce anxiety and depression while improving overall positive mental health in children and adolescents [77, 78].”