A recent study reveals children who get bullied during their physical exercise classes are less likely to take part in similar activities next year.
If obese kids are ragged or mistreated during their workouts, they are less likely to follow similar schedules the next year, states the study.
Bullying reduces physical activities in obese kids is well known, but astonishingly the rule applies even to normal weight children. The children who don't speak up or seek help were found to suffer more, reveals a recent post on counselandheal.
"Our finding that this applies to normal-weight kids also was novel," said Chad Jensen, a psychology professor at BYU and lead author on the study, in a press release.
Physical exercises not only strengthen the body but boost concentration, improve social intertactions and academic performance in children.
The researchers based their findings on three rounds of survey made on the 4th and 5th grade children from six different elementary schools in the beginning of a school year. In the first round the participants were asked about their health related problems, emotional well being, interactions with class mates and academic performances.
In the second round of the survey, the children were questioned on how often they got teased by their friends and other acquaintances during their physical activities. The questions on the teasing experiences were primarily based on three most common issues faced in such cases-
- Being made fun of when playing sports or exercising.
- Not being chosen to be on a sports team or other children looking or acting upset when the child was placed on the team.
- Being called insulting names when playing sports or exercising.
The third round survey dealt mostly with the situational questions related to how they were bullied and what emotional impact it had on them. Similar rounds of survey were conducted the next year with the same participants.
The latter survey showed a significant decrease in physical activity among the healthy weight students, who were teased during their physical activities and obese children were found to have declined health wise.
"Overweight kids who were teased reported poorer functional ability across domains (physical, social, academic and physical)," said Jensen in a statement."If we can help them to have a better perception of their physical and social skills, then physical activity may increase and health-related quality is likely to improve."
According to the researchers, the study has been an initiative taken to raise further awareness among people about the negative impacts of bullying.
More schools are adopting anti-bullying policies these days. However, another recent study reveals that schools are not providing enough scope for physical activity among children. In fact, most of the schools were found not to abide by the state mandated 100 minutes physical exercise every week for children, the study said.
