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CHAPTER 4: PARTICIPATION IN SPORTS AND PHYSICAL ACTIVITY

OUTSIDE SCHOOL

Participation in sport and physical recreation outside of school

4.1 In its strategy for developing physical activity ⁴, the Scottish Executive stated that young people should be doing at least one hour of moderate activity on most days of the week. While we do not know in detail for how long and on how many days a week young people are exercising from this survey, we can look at how many activities they are doing every week and through this attempt to build up a picture of the proportion doing 'regular' exercise.

4.2 Overall, this survey shows that 96% of young people participate in at least one sporting activity outside of school PE lessons and not organised by school.

Number of activities participated in

4.3 Around one in seven young people (15%) are doing 4+ activities at least once a week, with boys, 12 year olds and 13 year olds most likely to be doing so (see Table 4.1 below). Those living in rural areas are also considerably more likely to be doing 4+ activities than their peers living in urban areas (19%, compared with 13%).

4.4 The same proportion of young people (15%) also claim to be doing three activities at least once a week, while more are doing only two activities (20%) or one activity (28%). Boys and girls aged 15 are most likely to be participating in only one sporting activity outside of school at least once a week.

Table 4.1: Proportion of young people participating in sport outside of school, at least once a week

Types of activities participated in

4.5 Football is most popular among boys, with nearly half (48%) playing at least once a week. Girls, on the other hand, are most likely to do some type of dancing at least once a week (33%). Both boys and girls are equally likely to walk two miles or more for recreation or exercise every week (27% and 28% respectively) and a quarter do some other type of sport or physical recreation not specified here.

4.6 Cycling is also a popular activity for young people, with around one in six (16%) doing so at least once a week, rising to one in five (19%) of those living in rural areas. Girls are slightly more likely than boys to swim every week (17% vs. 13%), with 12 year old girls (26%) and those living in the most deprived areas (23%) most likely to do so.

4.7 The only other sport for which there appears to be a link between frequency of activity and level of deprivation is badminton, with young people living in the least deprived areas of the country nearly three times as likely to have participated in the sport on a weekly basis than those living in the most deprived areas (14%, compared with 5%).

Membership of clubs

4.8 Just over a quarter of young people (27%) are a member of a club through which they participate in sports outside of school, with a further 13% the member of two or more clubs (see Table 4.2 below).

Table 4.2: Number of club memberships

4.9 Figure 4.1 below highlights some clear gender differences in club membership: boys are most likely to be a member of a club through which they play football (22%), with membership tending to peak at age 13 (25%). Girls, on the other hand, are much more likely to belong to a club or organisation relating to dance (19%), with 14 year olds most likely to go to some form of dance club (23%).

4.10 Membership of clubs pertaining to other sports is lower, though one in ten boys (9%) is a member of a golf club and one in twenty girls (5%) belong to a swimming club.

Figure 4.1: Membership of clubs by gender

Base: All respondents aged 11-15 (1,762)
Source: IpsosMORI

4.11 There does not appear to be a consistent association between membership of clubs and deprivation or the urbanity or rurality of the area where young people live. There are, nonetheless, some significant distinctions worth highlighting:

• Young people living in the least deprived areas of the country are nearly four times as likely to be a member of a football or dance club than those living in the most deprived areas (both 15% vs. 4%);
• Those living in a small town are much more likely to be a member of a golf club (10% compared with 5% of those living in rural or urban areas); and
• Young people living in a rural area are significantly more likely to be a member of a badminton club than their peers living in urban areas (8% vs. 3%).

Amount of time spent doing physical activity

4.12 Boys tend to use up significantly more time taking part in physical recreation outside of PE than girls (around seven hours vs. four and a half hours in a typical week - see Table 4.3 below). However, whereas time spent in PE classes tends to increase with age (see Table 4.5 later in this chapter), here there is a steady fall in the amount of time spent by young people doing physical activity outside of school as they get older.

Table 4.3: Amount of time spent doing physical activity outside of school

4.13 Figure 4.2 below illustrates how the amount of time girls spend doing sport outside of school time peaks when they are 13 years old, whereas boys tend to be most active when they are aged 12 and the drop-off tends to be less marked as they become older.

Figure 4.2: Mean number of minutes spent taking part in sport or physical recreation outside of PE lessons in a typical week

Base: All respondents aged 12-15 (1,759)
Source: IpsosMORI

4.14 Fourteen year olds girls (9%) are most likely to say they have done no physical recreation outside of PE lessons, as are those living in a household where no parent works (10%, compared with 5% of those with both parents working).

Reasons for not participating in physical activity

4.15 The primary reason young people give for not having done any sport or recreational activity outside of PE lessons in the last 12 months (6% of total) is that they prefer to do other things in their spare time (38%). This is the most common explanation given by boys (43%), but for girls, the main rationale they give for their lack of participation is that they don't have anyone to do it with (25%). A quarter of both boys (25%) and girls (23%) say they just don't want to do any type of sport or physical recreation.

4.16 There are no significant differences between boys and girls as to why they haven't taken part in recreational activity, though boys are slightly more likely to be put off by the standard of changing facilities and the cost involved.

Table 4.4: Reasons for not participating in physical activity

4.17 Although not statistically significant because of the small base sizes involved, it is worth mentioning some other differences to emerge from analysis of how opinions vary across different factors:

• 14 and 15 year olds are particularly likely to say they are not interested in any sports (both 26%);
• 12 and 13 year olds are most concerned about getting injured (13% and 17% respectively);
• Young people living in a rural area are most likely to cite poor transport links as a factor in their lack of participation in physical recreation outside of school PE classes (26% vs. 13% of those living in an urban area).

INSIDE SCHOOL

Exercise in school - PE classes

4.18 Scotland has been dubbed the 'sick man of Europe' and the amount of physical exercise undertaken by young people has received increasing interest in recent years, as concerns over obesity among young people and the general population have grown ⁵. The Physical Education Review Group published a report in June 2004 ⁶ which looked at how Scottish schools could be supported to improve the PE curriculum. It looked at enhancing and increasing participation in PE and also young people's performance in PE, encouraging children to reach their full potential and maintain an interest in physical exercise beyond school.

4.19 In response to the report the then Scottish Executive gave a number of commitments on PE aimed at increasing the amount of time allocated to PE in the school curriculum and improving the range of activities on offer in schools, as well as providing extra PE teachers. One of the Review Group's recommendations was that schools should work towards providing 2 hours of good quality PE for each pupil every week.

4.20 It would appear to be a positive finding, therefore, that young people tend to spend an average of 2.5 hours in PE classes every week. As Table 4.5 below illustrates, boys reportedly spend around 20 minutes more in PE classes than girls (162 minutes vs. 139 minutes), whilst S3 pupils and S4 pupils tend to do 20-30 minutes more than their peers in S1 and S2.

Table 4.5: Amount of time spent in PE classes in school

4.21 Despite the many benefits of regular physical activity, girls are much more likely than boys to opt out of participating in both PE and extra-curricular physical activity opportunities at school ⁷. Indeed research shows that this gender imbalance begins early (Scottish Health Survey, 2003) ⁸ with overall levels of activity declining with age among girls after the age of 8-10. Here, analysis by age within gender also presents some interesting findings. Whilst there is no difference in the amount of time 12 year old boys and girls spend in PE classes, Figure 4.3 below illustrates significant differences for both 14 and 15 year olds, with boys spending far more time in PE than girls at this age.

Figure 4.3: Mean number of minutes spent taking part in PE classes in school in a typical week

Base: All respondents aged 12-15 (1,759)
Source: IpsosMORI

Exercise in school (but outside of PE classes)

4.22 Young people reportedly spend an average of 1 hour 17 minutes doing some form of sport or physical recreation organised through their school, but outside of PE classes, every week. This would include activities done as part of a school team or club or in a competition.

4.23 Significantly, more than a third of young people (35%) do not do any physical activity organised through the school, with 14 year olds (38%) and 15 year olds (39%) least likely to do so.

4.24 As with the amount of time young people spend in PE classes, boys tend to spend significantly more time doing activities outside of classes than girls (158 minutes vs. 115 minutes in a typical week). However, whereas time spent in PE classes tends to increase with age, here there is a steady decline in the amount of time young people spend doing physical activity outside of PE as they get older (see Table 4.6 below).

Table 4.6: Amount of time spent doing physical activity organised through school, but outside of PE class time

4.25 As with the amount of time spent in PE classes, there are some significant differences between genders and age groups. What is clear is that at each age, boys tend to spend far more time than girls doing activities outside of PE classes, a trend which is particularly evident among 12 year olds and 14 year olds.

Figure 4.4: Mean number of minutes spent taking part in physical activity organised through school but outside of PE classes in a typical week

Base: All respondents aged 12-15 (1,759)
Source: IpsosMORI

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