IMR Press / JOMH / Volume 18 / Issue 3 / DOI: 10.31083/j.jomh1803060
Open Access Original Research
Effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on barriers to middle-aged adults’ participation in physical activity in Turkey: a cross-sectional study
Show Less
1 Coaching Education Department, Faculty of Sport Sciences, Kırıkkale University, 71000 Kırıkkale, Turkey
2 Sports Management Department, Faculty of Sport Sciences, Tekirdağ Namık Kemal University, 59030 Tekirdağ, Turkey
*Correspondence: mehmetgulu80@gmail.com (Mehmet Gülü)
J. Mens. Health 2022, 18(3), 60; https://doi.org/10.31083/j.jomh1803060
Submitted: 1 October 2021 | Accepted: 15 November 2021 | Published: 1 March 2022
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sports and physical activities for men’s health)
Copyright: © 2022 The Author(s). Published by IMR Press.
This is an open access article under the CC BY 4.0 license.
Abstract

Background: Physical inactivity is one of the greatest problems facing the world today. The purpose of this study was to examine the level of barriers to physical activity for middle-aged adults during the COVID-19. Methods: Using an online survey, a sample of the Turkish population (n = 432: 48.6% female, 51.4% male; mean age 57.3 years) answered questions about sociodemographic characteristics as well as barriers to participation in physical activity during COVID-19 process. A scale of barriers to physical activity was used to determine the barriers to physical activity faced by the participants COVID-19 process. Since the data were homogeneously distributed across binary groups, independent t-tests and ANOVAs were performed for groups of three or more. In addition, if there were significant differences in the results of the ANOVA, Tukey’s post hoc test was also applied. The data were analyzed using SPSS Version 22.0. (IBM Corp., Armonk, NY, USA). Results: According to the findings of this study, barriers to physical activity increase significantly as perceived health status decreases, and women’s barriers to physical activity, participation are greater than those of men, and increase with age. At the same time, the strongest relationship was found for environmental factors. In addition, important results were found for the personal and social environment dimensions, and we also found that barriers to physical activity increase significantly with age. Conclusions: Finally, we determined that the barriers to physical activity for individuals with COVID-19 were significantly greater at the personal level compared to those who did not have COVID-19. That is the COVID-19 process negatively affected participation in physical activity.

Keywords
Adults
Community
Health promotion
Pandemic
Physical activity
Social isolation
Share
Back to top