Exercising little longer than usual can boost satisfaction with life

Exercising little longer than usual can boost satisfaction with life

    Extending your normal exercise routine by a few minutes may enhance your satisfaction with life, according to researchers. They found that people’s satisfaction with life was higher on days when they exercised more than usual. “The findings reinforce the idea that physical activity is a health behaviour with important consequences for daily well-being and should be considered when developing national policies to enhance satisfaction with life,” said Jaclyn Maher, kinesiology expert.
    The team examined the influence of physical activity on satisfaction with life among emerging adults, aged 18 to 25 years, because this population’s sense of well-being appears to worsen more quickly than at any other time during adulthood. “Emerging adults are going through a lot of changes — they are leaving home for the first time, attending college or starting jobs. As a result, their satisfaction with life can plummet. We focussed on them because they stand to benefit the most from strategies to enhance life satisfaction,” said Maher.
    “Shifts in depression, anxiety and stress would be expected to influence a person’s satisfaction with life at any given point in time,” said David Conroy, professor of kinesiology. “In addition, fatigue can be a barrier to engaging in physical activity, and a high Body Mass Index associated with being overweight may cause a person to be less satisfied in a variety of ways,” he added.
    By controlling for these variables, researchers were able to determine that the amount of physical activity a person undertakes in a particular day directly influences his or her satisfaction with life. Specifically, the team found that by exercising just a little more than usual a person could significantly improve his or her satisfaction with life. “Based on these findings, we recommend that people exercise a little longer or a little harder than usual as a way to boost satisfaction with life,” said Conroy. ANI

People’s satisfaction with life was higher on days when they exercised more than usual