Effects Of Playing Multiple Sports On Sport Life, And Basic Lifestyle Among Elementary School Children

The Sports Agency in Japan is promoting the reform of sports club activities in schools. It recommends that sports clubs must maintain their educational significance, promote playing multiple sports, and encourage local residents to be leaders. Under these circumstances, Nagoya city worked on reforming the elementary school club activities. This reform in elementary school club activities may be very effective from the perspective of growth and development. Therefore, we examined the outcomes of the reform with the cooperation of the city. PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to focus on multiple sport activities and examine their effects on increasing sports time and promoting a healthy lifestyle. METHODS: A questionnaire survey was conducted among 3,446 fourth- to sixth-grade children and 2,159 children’s data who consented to this study and accomplished all items were analyzed. Items related to participation in club activities, sports preferences, sports life, sleeping and study habits, playing games, and smartphone use were analyzed. We examined the differences in these items according to the number of sports played during the club activities using crosstabulations, χ2 test, and ANOVA. The Bonferroni method was applied for all multiple comparisons. RESULTS: Children who played multiple sports were significantly more likely to answer that they liked sports and spent significantly more time playing outside of physical education classes. Similarly, an increase in sports time associated with participation in club activities was also confirmed to have a significant relationship with the number of sports played. Although a significant relationship with sleep duration was confirmed only for fifth graders, overall, children who played a greater number of sports tended to sleep longer. The bedtime on weekdays was significantly later for the children who did not participate in club activities. Although no significant differences were found between playing video games and smartphone use, the ratio of smartphone ownership was significantly higher among sixth graders who played a lesser number of sports. CONCLUSIONS: These results suggest that promoting multiple sports activities contributes to an increase in children's physical activity time, healthy lifestyle, and good sports life.