Teenagers should walk to school to improve mental health, new research finds
Teenagers who took more than 8,000 steps a day reported better mental health than those who walked under 5,000
Teenagers should walk to school and the shops to improve their mental health, according to new research.
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A study based on 5,500 adolescents in the US with an average age of around 12 found the more children walked, the fewer mental health problems they had a year later.
Those who took under 5,000 steps a day had the most symptoms of poorer mental health, while those averaging around 8,000 had fewer and those hitting 12,000 or more had the fewest of all.
The participants were given Fitbit devices to wear for three weeks.
A year later, researchers checked in on their mental health using a checklist completed by young people and their parents to measure symptoms such as anxiety, low mood and behavioural problems.
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Adolescents with the highest step counts also showed slightly thicker brain tissue in two areas involved in movement and regulating emotion, researchers found.
There was no link found between step count and how well they did at school.
The experts concluded: “In this…study, higher daily step counts were associated with structural differences in the brains of adolescents, which were in turn associated with better mental outcomes prospectively.
“Beneficial associations for mental health appeared to accrue continuously across the observed range, with no evidence of a threshold or plateau, highlighting that every step counts and the potential value of promoting daily steps in adolescents.”
The study was led by the King’s College London’s institute of psychiatry, psychology and neuroscience, working with the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
Dr Divyangana Rakesh, from King’s and senior author of the study, said: “This study gives us some of the clearest evidence yet that even an everyday, low-cost, accessible measures of physical activity like daily step count is tied to how adolescent brains and mental health develop.
“What’s striking is that we don’t see this benefit levelling off in the observed range, even among the most active young people in our sample.”
Dr Amanda Paluch, associate professor of kinesiology at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, said: “Adolescence is a key period for brain development and mental health, so it’s encouraging to see that physical activity’s benefits extend to both.
“It is not an all-or-nothing situation.
“Adolescents don’t need to be elite athletes to benefit, 1,000 to 2,000 higher daily step increments, from any starting point, was associated with better brain structure and mental health outcomes, and that beneficial association keeps building from there.
“The goal is finding realistic, sustainable ways to move more, through everyday opportunities like walking to school, active play and activities kids actually enjoy, so these benefits are accessible wherever an adolescent is starting from.”