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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Behav. Neurosci.
Sec. Emotion Regulation and Processing
Volume 18 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fnbeh.2024.1428347
This article is part of the Research Topic Mind-body medicine and its impacts on psychological networks, quality of life, and health - Volume II View all 21 articles

A longitudinal examination of the effect of physical exercise on the emotional states of college students: Exploring the sense of coherence as a mediator through a cross-lagged panel analysis

Provisionally accepted
Yunxia Cao Yunxia Cao 1,2Lin Luo Lin Luo 1*
  • 1 School of Physical Education, Guizhou Normal University, Guiyang, China
  • 2 Guizhou Sports Vocational College, Guiyang, Guizhou Province, China

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

    longitudinal study aimed to investigate the causal relationship between physical exercise and emotional states among university students, focusing on the mediating role of sense of coherence.Method ： A total of 1215 university students (aged 18-25 years) were recruited and completed questionnaires assessing physical activity (International Physical Activity Questionnaire-Short Form), emotional states (Positive and Negative Affect Schedule), and sense of coherence (Sense of Coherence Scale-13) at three time points over a three-month period. Preliminary analyses included independent samples t-tests, chi-square tests, and Pearson correlations. Cross-lagged panel mediation analysis was conducted using Mplus 8.3, with bootstrapping employed to test indirect effects.Results： Results indicated that sense of coherence significantly predicted positive affect ( β = 0.259-0.369, p < 0.001). Positive affect, in turn, predicted physical exercise ( β = 0.083-0.182, p < 0.05), while negative affect also influenced physical exercise (β = -0.096-0.203, p < 0.05). Physical exercise indirectly influenced positive affect through sense of coherence (β = 0.037, p = 0.045), and positive affect indirectly influenced physical exercise through sense of coherence (β = 0.029, p = 0.028). Other indirect effects involving physical exercise, sense of coherence, and negative affect were non-significant.Conclusion： This study underscores the importance of sense of coherence in promoting emotional well-being among university students and in the reciprocal relationship between physical exercise and positive emotional states. Findings suggest that interventions targeting sense of coherence may enhance the emotional benefits of physical exercise. Future research should explore other potential mediators and moderators of the relationship between physical exercise and emotions and examine the effectiveness of sense of coherence-based interventions on well-being in this population.

    Keywords: physical exercise, emotional states, Sense of Coherence, longitudinal study, Mediation analysis, college students

    Received: 06 May 2024; Accepted: 07 Aug 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Cao and Luo. 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: Lin Luo, School of Physical Education, Guizhou Normal University, Guiyang, China

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