Impact of COVID-19 on Physical Activity Behavior and Well-Being Outcomes [COVID-19 and Physical Activity Series]

The Impact of COVID-19 on Physical Activity Behavior and Well-Being of Canadians by Drs. Lesser and Nienhuis is an online survey of 1,098 Canadian adults.  Data was collected in April and May 2020 on demographics, physical activity behavior, outdoor physical activity, and measures of well-being.  Participants were categorized as active or inactive using a 150 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity per week cutoff, and asked about changes in physical activity since restriction onset, type of physical activity, location of physical activity (indoors, outdoors or both) and whether the location had changed due to social distancing measures, and barriers and facilitators to physical activity.  Drs. Lesser and Nienhuis found significant differences between inactive and active individuals, with a larger portion of inactive individuals reporting less physical activity and a larger portion of active individuals reporting more physical activity since COVID-19.  Specifically, 40.5% of inactive individuals became less active, while only 22.4% of active individuals became less active. In comparison, 33% of inactive individuals became more active while 40.3% of active individuals became more active.   Drs. Lesser and Nienhuis also found that inactive and active individuals that became relatively less active reported significantly less benefit, less enjoyment, less confidence, less support and fewer opportunities to be active.  In contrast, inactive individuals who became more active or maintained their physical activity levels during COVID-19, especially outdoor physical activity, had lower anxiety than those who decreased their physical activity levels. Physical activity was strongly associated with well-being in inactive individuals, suggesting that health-promoting measures directed towards increasing physical activity levels in inactive individuals may be essential to improving well-being.

Lesser, I. A., & Nienhuis, C. P. (2020). The Impact of COVID-19 on Physical Activity Behavior and Well-Being of Canadians. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 17(11), 3899.