Bidirectional Associations Between Physical Activity and Internalizing Symptoms in Early Adolescence: A Four-Wave Cross-Lagged Panel Model with Random Intercepts
Longitudinal cohort study demonstrates bidirectional links between physical activity and internalizing symptoms in early adolescents, suggesting activity protects mental health.
Key Points
To disentangle within-person effects from between-person differences in the bidirectional relationship between physical activity and mental health symptoms across early adolescence.
Analyzed four longitudinal waves of data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study following youth (N = 6,361) from ages 10 to 14.2 years.
Evaluated youth-reported physical activity and parent-reported internalizing and externalizing behaviors (Child Behavior Checklist) using a four-wave random-intercepts cross-lagged panel model (RI-CLPM).
Higher physical activity predicted fewer internalizing symptoms from year 2 to year 3 (β = -0.037, 95% CI [-0.062, -0.012]) and from year 3 to year 4 (β = -0.045, 95% CI [-0.068, -0.022]).
Greater internalizing symptoms predicted reduced physical activity from year 2 to year 3 (β = -0.076, 95% CI [-0.125, -0.027]) and from year 3 to year 4 (β = -0.075, 95% CI [-0.118, -0.031]).
No statistically significant cross-lagged or between-person associations were detected between physical activity and externalizing symptoms.