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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Public Health
Sec. Public Mental Health
Volume 12 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2024.1370118
This article is part of the Research Topic Psychological Factors in Physical Education and Sport - Volume IV View all 4 articles

Life Satisfaction among Spanish Children and Adolescents Participating in Physical Education

Provisionally accepted
Santiago Gómez-Paniagua Santiago Gómez-Paniagua 1Antonio Castillo-Paredes Antonio Castillo-Paredes 2*Carmen Galán Arroyo Carmen Galán Arroyo 3*Jorge Rojo-Ramos Jorge Rojo-Ramos 1
  • 1 Facultad de Ciencias del Deporte, Universidad de Extremadura, Cáceres, Spain
  • 2 Universidad de Las Americas, Chile, Santiago, Santiago Metropolitan Region (RM), Chile
  • 3 Faculty of Sports Sciences, University of Extremadura, Cáceres, Spain

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Life satisfaction has been determined as a cognitive indicator of subjective wellbeing, a term that acquires vital relevance during adolescence as a protective factor against numerous psychological, mental and social disorders. Therefore, the objectives of this study are: 1) to evaluate differences in life satisfaction as a function of gender and school environment in Spanish children and adolescents; and 2) examine the possible associations between life satisfaction and age and/or body mass index (BMI) of the student body. For this purpose, a cross-sectional study was carried out with 723 students (aged 6 to 18 years) in which the "Satisfaction with life Scale" was applied, consisting of 5 items that measure self-perception of life satisfaction. Nonparametric statistics (Mann-Whitney U test) were used to explore differences in scores according to sex and school environment, in addition to Spearman's Rho test to identify associations between scale scores and students' age and BMI. Significant differences were obtained in terms of sex in favor of the male gender, and between the two environments of the centers in favor of the rural ones. In addition, the two variables explored (age and BMI) showed significant inverse associations with life satisfaction levels. Therefore, educational interventions and policies must take this information into account to design and develop actions aimed at improving this cognitive factor.

    Keywords: life satisfaction, Adolescent, Children, Physical Education, Students, School

    Received: 24 Jan 2024; Accepted: 03 May 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Gómez-Paniagua, Castillo-Paredes, Galán Arroyo and Rojo-Ramos. 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:
    Antonio Castillo-Paredes, Universidad de Las Americas, Chile, Santiago, Santiago Metropolitan Region (RM), Chile
    Carmen Galán Arroyo, Faculty of Sports Sciences, University of Extremadura, Cáceres, Spain

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