Retos: Nuevas Tendencias en Educación Física, Deportes y Recreación (Dec 2024)

Joint associations of sports participation and smartphone screen time with anxiety among school adolescents

  • Rafael Lucas Brasil Costa,
  • João Paulo Rodrigues dos Santos,
  • José Damião Saraiva Gomes-Júnior,
  • Samuel Lira da Silva Barbosa,
  • Eriston de Souza Bezerra,
  • Hele de Souza Bezerra,
  • Fabio Thiago Maciel da Silva,
  • Kassio Formiga da Cruz,
  • Vagner Deuel de O. Tavares,
  • Isabela Almeida Ramos,
  • Ludmila Lucena Pereira Cabral,
  • Rodrigo Alberto Vieira Browne

DOI
https://doi.org/10.47197/retos.v61.108784
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 61

Abstract

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To investigate the joint association of sports participation and smartphone screen time (ST) with anxiety symptoms in school adolescents. This cross-sectional study included 142 Brazilian high school adolescents from a federal public school. Anxiety symptoms were assessed using the Screen for Child Anxiety Related Disorders, with a cutoff point of ≥ 30. Sports participation was measured using the Habitual Physical Activity Questionnaire for Adolescents, classifying participants as sports participation or non-sports participation. ST was measured using the digital well-being function of the smartphone, categorizing participants into low ST and high ST based on the median. Participants were distributed into four groups: sports participation + low ST, sports participation + high ST, non-sports participation + low ST, and non-sports participation + high ST (reference group). Analysis was performed using Poisson regression with robust variance to calculate prevalence ratio (PR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) for anxiety among groups. The prevalence of anxiety was 41.5% (95% CI 33.6, 50.0). The sports participation + low ST group exhibited a lower prevalence of anxiety compared to the reference group (PR 0.52; 95% CI 0.28, 0.94; p = 0.031). The other groups showed no significant association with the reference group (p > 0.05). In conclusion, sports participation associated with low smartphone ST is related to a lower prevalence of anxiety symptoms in school adolescents. Keywords: Sports. Exercise. Sedentary time. Mental health. Adolescence.

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