Abstract
PurposeThe present study aimed to examine the link between physical activity (PA) and life satisfaction in a large international study of adolescents. We also aimed to test whether overweight and underweight perceptions act as mediators and whether age and sex acted as moderators. MethodsFor this purpose, we analyzed data from the Health Behavior in School-aged Children study, which comprises 727,865 observations from 44 nations at 4 measurement occasions. ResultsMultilevel analyses revealed a positive link between PA and life satisfaction. In addition, underweight and overweight perceptions mediated the effect of PA on life satisfaction. We further found that age and sex acted as moderators. In older adolescents, stronger effects were found in the links between PA and life satisfaction, PA and overweight perception, and both weight perceptions and life satisfaction. In addition, in female adolescents, the link between overweight perception and life satisfaction was stronger. Conversely, the links between PA and both weight perceptions were stronger for boys. ConclusionThe results suggest that weight perception explains part of the relationship between PA and life satisfaction in adolescents and that these effects vary as a function of age and sex.
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