BRIEF RESEARCH REPORT article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Sport Psychology
This article is part of the Research TopicPhysical Education, Health and Education Innovation-Vol IVView all articles
Barriers to Physical Activity in Spanish Adolescents: Gender differences
Provisionally accepted
María Martín-Rodríguez1,2*
María Isabel Barriopedro-Moro1,2
Jaime Prieto3
José Antonio Santacruz-Lozano4
Ángel Luis Clemente-Remón4- 1Universidad Politecnica de Madrid Facultad de Ciencias de la Actividad Fisica y del Deporte, Madrid, Spain
- 2Universidad Politecnica de Madrid, Madrid, Spain
- 3Universidad Rey Juan Carlos - Campus de Madrid, Madrid, Spain
- 4Universidad de Alcala, Alcala de Henares, Spain
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Given the concerning levels of physical inactivity among adolescents, particularly girls, the aim of this study was to identify gender differences in perceived barriers to physical activity (PA). A representative sample of 3159 secondary school students in Spain (1580 girls and 1579 boys; mean age = 13.7 ± 0.7 years) completed the Perceived Barriers Scale to PA. The structure of the scale was examined to ensure its suitability for this population. While the original version included four types of barriers, two of them (contextual and safety) were found to be closely related. These were therefore combined into a single "environmental barriers" category, resulting in a revised model that fit the data well. The analysis showed that girls perceived more temporal and intrapersonal barriers to PA than boys. Additionally, regardless of gender, students who did not participate in extracurricular physical activities reported higher levels of all three types of barriers. These findings suggest that promotion strategies should pay special attention to the challenges faced by girls and less active adolescents in order to foster greater equity in physical activity.
Keywords: adolescents, barriers, gender, physical activity, Secondary students
Received: 26 Nov 2025; Accepted: 27 Jan 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Martín-Rodríguez, Barriopedro-Moro, Prieto, Santacruz-Lozano and Clemente-Remón. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: María Martín-Rodríguez
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