Physical self-esteem and appearance in adolescents that practise physical activity at different levels

The importance of physical activity for individuaI well-being has often been underlined in literature, in particular for adolescents (e.g. Fox, 1997).This work examines within the discrepancy and domain-importance approaches (e.g.Marsh, 1986;Marsh & Hattie, 1996)the differences between adolescents that practise physical activity, respectively, in a continuous (more than 3 times a week) and non-continuous way (3 or less than 3 times a week). A sample of 397 adolescents balanced for gender and aged 14 - 16, completed the subsequent instruments concerning physical self-esteem predictors connected with appearance: 1)A modified form ofthe Appearance Scale of PSDQ (Marsh et aL, 1994, Meleddu et al. 2002): Appearance Discrepancy. 2) The Global Physical Scale of PSDQ (Marsh et al., 1994, Meleddu et al. 2002): Physical Self-Esteem. 3) The Appearance Schemas Inventory (Cash&Labarge, 1996):Self-Investment, Vulnerability, Sterotypes. Theeffects ofAppearance Discrepancy, Self-Investment, Vulnerability and Sterotypes on Physical Self-Esteem were examined with a multiple regression approach, on the two groups. Differences between non-continuous and continuous group seem to be connected especially with Self-Investment. Self-Investment has no effect on Physical Self-Esteem, in the first group, while it has a significant one on the secondo For both groups, Discrepancy has a positive effect, Vulnerability affects negatively Physical Self-Esteem, and Stereotypes have no significant effect. Self-Investment differences support the domain-importance approach. The positive effect of physical activity on an important domain such as appearance can improve the sense of competence and bring to a more positive evaluation of one's physical-self.