Perception of sports participation on academic stress among female senior secondary school students in Jaffna education zone

Abstract

Introduction: The World Health Organization reported nearly 81% of adolescents did not achieve the recommended level of physical activity worldwide. Sports participation increases alertness, and recollects information, which increases academic activity. Sports participation inspires to accomplish the heavy academic goal, attend school regularly, reduce discontinuation of school and get better academic scores. Being physically active reduces the physical inactive related diseases and improve the daily life. This leads to better academic performance. Objective: To assess the relation of perception of sports participation on academic performance among female senior secondary school students in the Jaffna education zone. Methodology: A school-based descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted among grades 10, 11, 12 and 13 female students in the Jaffna educational zone. A validated self-administered questionnaire was used for data collection. Data were analyzed using SPSS 23. Ethical clearance was obtained from the Ethical Review Committee, Faculty of Medicine, University of Jaffna. Results: The estimated sample size was 845 and 830 students were responded. The age range of the participants were between 15 and 19 years with a mean age of 16.48 years (SD=1.40). Students who participate in sports are 268 (32.3%) and non-participants are 562 (67.7%). Pearson correlation revealed that the perception of sports participation significant weak positive correlation between the perception of academic performance (r=0.158, p=0.000) Conclusion: There is no strong impact of sports participation on academic performance of female senior secondary school students in Jaffna education.