Social Leisure-time Activities Research Articles

Social leisure time activities as a mediating link between self-reported psychological symptoms in adolescence and psychiatric morbidity by young adulthood: the Northern Finland 1986 Birth Cohort study

Research indicates that adolescent psychological symptoms are associated with subsequent mental health disorders. Studies also show the association of leisure activity with improved current and future mental health. However, research is limited on whether social leisure time activity is a mediating link in the association between psychological symptoms and later psychiatric morbidity. We examined whether adolescence-related social leisure time activity, per se, is a mediating link in the association between adolescent psychological symptoms and later psychiatric morbidity. The study population was based on the Northern Finland Birth Cohort 1986 Study (NFBC 1986; n = 6709; 3227 males). Psychological symptoms at age 15–16 years were measured with the Youth Self Report (YSR) questionnaire. Study participants’ psychiatric morbidity by the age of 33 years was assessed using the diagnoses from the nationwide health care registers. Our results showed an association between psychological symptoms and leisure time activities that varied depending on the level of social activity. Leisure time activity was found to be a mediating link between psychological symptoms in adolescence and psychiatric disorders in early adulthood. Adolescence-related leisure time activities, which differed with regard to social interactions, appeared to serve as a mediating link between adolescent psychological symptoms and later onset of psychiatric disorders. Socially active leisure time during adolescence is related to better long-term mental health, while socially inactive leisure time associates with the likelihood of later psychiatric morbidity. To prevent psychiatric disorders, enhancing such leisure time activities in society is highly recommended.

Vztah preferovaných volnočasových aktivit a tvořivosti u českých adolescentů

The theme of the study is to analyze the relationship between leisure activities and creativity in the population of Czech adolescents aged 13-15 years. Prague respondents (N = 398, eighth grade pupils and first-year students of a six-year grammar school) completed two tests of creativity. The first one former was the Torrance Test of Incomplete Figures examining nonverbal creativity, the latter was the original Monkey test examining verbal creativity by writing a short story about a picture. The results of the verbal and nonverbal test of creativity were confronted with the leisure time activities of the respondents. In the case of creative activities and creativity tests, a relation was found by explorative factor analysis, analysis of variance (ANOVA), and Pearson´s correlation coefficient. Furthermore, a positive relation was found between creative leisure time activities and the nonverbal factor and even in the case of verbal factor of creativity (r=0.149 and r=0.161; p<0.01). A positive relation was found between social leisure time activities and verbal factor of creativity among students of grammar school (r=0.143). A negative relation was also found between passive leisure time activities and verbal factor of creativity (r=-0.101; p<0.05). The type of school explained almost 12 % variance of measured creativity in the Torrance Test, gender explained 2 %. Students of grammar schools scored in both creativity tests significantly higher than primary school pupils. Further, gender differences were found in both creativity tests while girls scored significantly higher than boys.

Bicycle Master Plan for Adana, Turkey

The study is based on developing a bikeway master plan by determining the utility of bicycle routes, assessing their contributions to urban transportation, their effect on individual and social leisure time activities, and the behavior and demands of the people in the City of Adana, Turkey. Sixteen routes were evaluated according to 14 criteria that include physical and environmental conditions, land use types, and user characteristics to determine level of service. The results ranged from 2.15 to 58.32 on a 90-point scale. The total length of bicycle routes included in the study (110.9 km) reached 120 km by adding 9.1 km of additional routes to provide continuity of the routes and demands of the user. Three different bikeway types were predicted for the study area, taking into account the width of the roads, the possibilities for expansion (land use type and expropriation requirements at road boundaries), and vehicle/pedestrian circulation density. Bicycle paths that were grade-separated from pedestrian and vehicular roads formed 29.8 km. Bicycle lanes designated as pedestrian roads formed 10.2 km. Bicycle lanes designated as vehicular roads formed 80 km.

Social costs of poverty; leisure time socializing and the subjective experience of social isolation among 13–16-year-old Norwegians

The article examines leisure time socializing and the subjective experience of social isolation among Norwegian 13–16-year-olds in poor families. The empirical analyses use data from a representative survey in Norway in 2002 and show the likelihood of participation in leisure time socializing with peers to be lower among 13–16-year-olds in poor families than among adolescents in more affluent families. The effect of living in a poor family is stronger for structured (organized activities) and semi-structured (home-based) socializing. Hence, poor adolescents may be particularly vulnerable to missing out on experiences and contacts accessed through these arenas. Moreover, adolescents reporting their family to be poor more often perceive themselves as unpopular and as lacking close friends. The lower rate of participation in social leisure time activities, however, could not explain the increased risk of these adolescents experiencing themselves as socially isolated. Thus, the findings point toward more intricate processes of shame and stigmatization through which poverty may affect adolescents' subjective feelings of social isolation.