Mood Responses to Recreational Sport andExercise in a Korean Sample

David L. RudolphDepartment of Exercise and Sport Science, 237-L HHP Building

University of North Carolina-GreensboroGreensboro, NC 27412-5001

Jin Gu KimResearch Institute for Physical Education and Sport Science

Kyung-Pook University, Taegu, South Korea 702-701

It is well documented that aerobic exercise produces mood benefits.However, research examining the potential mood benefits of competi-tive sport at the recreational level is lacking (Berger, 1994). Therefore,the primary purpose of the present study was to compare the moodresponses of four activity groups; (1) aerobic dance, (2) soccer, (3)tennis, and (4) bowling. A second purpose was to examine the utility ofa recently developed measure of exercise-related mood in a Koreansample of 108 male and female physical education students. Mood wasassessed immediately pre- and post-activity with the Subjective ExerciseExperiences Scale (SEES: McAuley & Coumeya, 1994). Aerobic danceand soccer participants reported enhanced positive mood pre- to post-activityip < .05). Tennis players atid howlers reported no change. Noneof the activities reduced feelings of negative mood as assessed by theSEES. These preliminary results suggest that recreational soccer pro-duces mood benefits similar to aerobic dance. Furthermore, althoughthe subscales of the SEES were intercorrelated similarly to previousresearch, the ability of the measure to tap changes in negative moodwarrants further examination.

It is well documented that acute exercise produces mood benefits(See Petruzzello, Landers, Hatfield, Kubitz, & Salazar, 1991; North,McCullagh, & Tran, 1990; McAuley & Rudolph, 1995 for reviews).However, the potential psychological benefits of participating in recre-ational sport activities has been largely ignored (Berger, 1994),

In the face of losing, competitive sport has the potential to generatepsychological detriments such as increased anxiety, depression, and

Authors' Note: The authors would like to extend their appreciation to the editor and threeanonymous reviewers who made helpful comments on an earlier draft of this article.Conespondence should be addressed to the first author(e-mail: dlnidolp@homans.uncg.edu).Journal ofSocial Behavior and Personality, 1996, Vol. 11, No. 4, 841-849.1996 Select Press, Corte Madera, CA, 415/924-1612.

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hostility (Hackfort & Speilberger, 1989). Clearly, serious competitivesport has limited potential for reducing stress and anxiety because theimportance of winning probably overrides any potential affective benefitsto be gained from the physical activity that occurs during sport. Further-more, Berger (1994) has suggested that "If stress reduction is a primarygoal of participating in physical exercise, competition should probably beavoided" (p. 104), Berger has also stated that research examining thepotential mood benefits of competitive sport at the recreational level islacking. For instance, whether a friendly game of tennis or pick-upbasketball produce enhanced moods is unknown. Moreover, are the moodresponses to these types of physical activities different from those ofjogging and other aerobic activities that are typically employed to exam-ine mood changes associated with exercise?

Berger and Owen (1988) have outlined a stress reduction taxonomywhich specifies that for exercise to reduce stress it must be (1) aerobic, (2)non-competitive, (3) predictable, and (4) rhythmical/repetitive. Accord-ing to their taxonomy, other parameters that influence the effects ofexercise on psychological well-being include exercise frequency, dura-tion, and intensity. Moreover, the degree to which an individual enjoys aspecific physical activity plays an important role in the potential for moodbenefits to accrue,

Berger and Owen's (1988) rationale for developing this classifica-tion system is based in its predictive value for health professionals.Instead of testing the mood benefits of an infinite number of physicalactivities, the classification system identifies those characteristics of theactivity that are most likely to produce mood benefits. Therefore, exerciseprescription for mood benefits is based on the degree to which an activityfulfills each taxonomy parameter. This taxonomy provides a potentiallyuseful framework for comparison of the mood changes associated withrecreational sport and aerobic exercise.

According to Berger and Owen's (1988) classification system, exer-cise must occur 2-3 times per week for 20 minutes at a moderate intensitylevel to generate psychological benefits. As the activity groups in thecurrent study met 2 times per week for 50 minutes, the guidelines of atleast 20 minutes 2-3 times per week were surpassed. Moreover, althoughparticipant's exertion levels were not assessed, the fact that these groupswere elective physical education classes suggests that the intensity of theactivities in the present study were probably moderate. Also, participantsexercised at preferred intensities which one might argue are most appro-priate when examining the potential psychological benefits of exercise;

We set out to examine the predictive value of Berger and Owen'staxonomy by contrasting activities that differed in the degree to which

Rudolph & Kim PHYSICAL ACTIVITY AND MOOD

TABLE 1 Each Group's Fulfillment of the Exercise Taxonomy

Taxonomy ParametersGroup

Aerobic DanceSoccerTennisBowling

Aerobic

yesyes*yes*no

Competition Absent

yesno

no

no

Predictable

yesno

no

no

Repetitive

yesno

no

no

*aerobic component weaker than aerobic dance.

they met the four mode criteria of the taxonomy. In the current study, wecompared participant's mood responses to four types of physical activi-ties. As shown in Table 1, aerobic dance satisfied all of the moderequirements for Berger & Owen's taxonomy. Bowling was the controlactivity because it does not fulfill any of the classification requirements.Soccer and Tennis provided infonnation about the effects of competition,predictability, and to a lesser extent repetitiveness and rhythm.

To our knowledge, only one previous study has contrasted the effectsof aerobic exercise and recreational sport on mood states, Bosscher(1993) compared the effects of 8 weeks of running and recreational sporton depression and self-esteem in depressed psychiatric patients. Depres-sion levels were significantly reduced in the running condition, whereasno change occurred for the recreational sport group. Self-esteem in-creased in both conditions, although the increase was greater for psychi-atric patients in the running condition. This preliminary study suggeststhat recreational sport may produce mood benefits in clinically depressedindividuals. However, the potential for steady-state aerobic exercise toproduce psychological benefits appears to be greater than for that ofrecreational sport. It should be noted that the psychological measures inBosscher's study were global assessments and would not be appropriateto include in an examination of state responses to acute exercise, thereforemeaningful coniparisons to the current investigation are limited.

Data used for the development and validation of the SubjectiveExercise Experiences Scale (SEES: McAuley & Courneya, 1994) showedthat stationary cycling produces decreases in negative mood and .in-creases in positive mood as assessed by the SEES in a sample of middle-aged males and females, McAuley and Coumeya (1994) called for futureresearch to examine the effectiveness of the SEES in diverse exercisesettings and across different populations. In a follow-up study investigat-ing the validity of the scale, Lox and Rudolph (1994) reported that 35

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minutes of aerobic dance produced increases in positive mood anddecreases in negative mood in a sample of 163 college females. Althoughthe SEES appears to be a valid and reliable measure of exercise-relatedmood across different age groups and exercise modes, its utility as ameasure of exercise-related mood in other cultures remains to be deter-mined.

The purpose of the current study was to compare the effects of aerobicdance and recreational sports on mood responses to acute exercise. Spe-cifically, we contrasted the effects of aerobic dance, soccer, tennis, anda control activity (bowling) on multidimensional exercise-related mood.As Berger and Owen (1988) have suggested that the absence of competitionwill enhance the mood benefits associated with physical activity, wehypothesized that aerobic dance will generate greater increases in posi-tive mood compared to soccer and tennis. Moreover, we expected aerobicdance to produce greater decreases in negative mood compared to recre-ational sport. Finally, as bowling fulfills none of the taxonomy require-ments described by Berger and Owen (1988), we expected no moodchanges as assessed by the SEES for the bowling control group,

A secondary purpose was to examine the utility of a recently devel-oped measure of exercise-related mood in a Korean sample,

METHODParticipants

108 male and female undergraduates (mean age 24,1 years) enrolledin physical education courses at a Korean University participated in thestudy. The sample consisted of four separate activity classes includingaerobic dance (N = 27,19M 8F), soccer (N = 24,24M OF), tennis (N = 28,21M 7F), and bowling (N = 29, 26M 3F), All participants signed in-formed consent forms prior to participating in the study and no studentrefused to participate.

MeasuresMood was assessed with the Subjective Exercise Experiences Scale

(SEES) (McAuley & Courneya, 1994), a 12-item three dimensional scaleassessing; (1) positive well-being, (2) psychological distress, and (3)fatigue. The main question asks "How do you feel right now?" and eachadjective item of the 12-item scale is accompanied by a 7-point Likertscale ranging from I = "Not at all" to 7 := "Very much so". Scoring theSEES consists of summing the four items of each dimension providing arange of 4-28. The SEES has been demonstrated to be a valid and reliablemeasure of mood in various exercise settings and populations (Lox &Rudolph, 1994; McAuley & Courneya, 1994), For the present study, the

Rudolph & Kim PHYSICAL ACTIVITY AND MOOD 845

SEES was translated into Korean by a bilingual sport and exercisepsychologist,

PROCEDUREActivity classes met twice a week for one semester. All four groups

were taught by the same instructor. The aerobic dance class consisted offive minutes of warm-up stretching followed by 45 minutes of highimpact aerobic exercise to music. The soccer, tennis, and bowling classescomprised a five minute instruction review period followed by 45 min-utes of playing. Classes were in their 10th week of the semester so theparticipants were spending the majority of class time doing the activityrather than receiving instruction. No participant was enrolled in morethan one group. In each of the four activity classes, the SEES wasadministered immediately before and following the class. Prior to theadministration of the scale, participants were given instructions on theformat of the measure and were also asked to respond honestly to each ofthe items on the SEES,

RESULTSPreliminary Analyses

Analyses of variance were conducted to examine pre-existing differ-ences between the activity groups in each of the affective dimensions onthe SEES. The results revealed no significant differences between theactivity groups in positive well-being, psychological distress, or fatigueprior to the activity class. Group means and standard deviations forpositive well-being, psychological distress, and fatigue are shown inTable 2, To examine the pre- and post-activity internal consistency of thesubscales on the SEES, coefficient alphas were calculated. The resultsindicated adequate internal consistencies for positive well-being (a >,89), psychological distress (a > ,87), and fatigue (a > .86).Mood Responses to Exercise

A repeated measures MANOVA was conducted to examine theeffects of exercise on mood. The results indicated significant (4) group X(3) mood [F (8, 190) = 2,68, p < ,016] and (4) group X (2) time [F (4,99)= 3,19, p < ,027] interactions. Follow-up univariate analyses revealed asignificant group by time interaction for the positive well-being dimen-sion of the SEES [F (4, 102) = 4,98, p < ,003], The interaction forpsychological distress approached significance [F (4, 99) = 2,30, p Sl

being were moderately related to lower levels of psychological distressand fatigue, and psychological distress and fatigue were positively re-lated,

DISCUSSIONAdopting Berger and Owen's (1988) taxonomy for stress reduction

and enhanced psychological well-being through exercise participation,we set out to contrast the effects aerobic dance, soccer, tennis, andbowling physical education classes on exercise-related mood. We werealso interested in the utility of the SEES, a recently developed measure ofexercise-related mood, in a Korean sample of university students.

We found partial support for the hypothesis that acute exercise in theform of aerobic dance would produce greater increases in positive well-being compared to soccer and tennis. Aerobic dancers reported increasesin positive well-being and tennis players reported no changes. However,soccer player's and aerobic dancer's increases in positive well-beingwere equivalent. With respect to the psychological distress and fatiguedimensions of the SEES, our hypotheses were not supported as nosignificant reductions were found in any of the groups. The finding that acompetitive recreational team sport (soccer) generated increases in posi-tive well-being does not appear to be supportive of Berger and Owen'staxonomy. In fairness, Berger often characterizes her taxonomy as astress reduction model which predicts the effects of exercise on thereduction of negative psychological symptomology. However, in muchof her work she has employed the Profile of Mood States (McNair, Lorr,& Droppleman, 1971) which possesses both positive and negative sub-scales.

Whether increases in positive mood represent reductions in stress isdebatable. In the current study, the correlational analyses of thp dimen-sions of the SEES clearly indicate that variance in positive and negativefeelings are at least moderately dependent upon each other. Conversely,our finding that positive mood increased while negative mood remainedunchanged supports the contention of numerous social psychologists thatthe two constructs are orthogonal (Watson, Clark, & Tellegen, 1988),Nevertheless, our finding that competitive physical activity in the form ofrecreational soccer generates improvements in psychological well-beingdoes not support the suggestions of Berger and Owen (1988) that com-petitiveness reduces the potential affective benefits of exercise.

It is encouraging that both aerobic dance and soccer increased

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positive mood, as much less is known about the effects of exercise onpositive feelings. The vast majority of research examining the relation-ship between exercise participation and psychological health has focusedon the reduction of negative symptoms such as anxiety and depression(McAuley & Courneya, 1994).

It is not clear why soccer produced increases in positive well-beingand tennis did not. Perhaps there is something about the team atmospherethat is more conducive to producing enhanced positive feelings that isabsent from the individual sport environment. It may be the case thatwinning or losing is more salient in the individual sport environment thanin the team situation which increases the chances of the competitiveoutcome overriding any potential mood benefits gained from the activity.Also, using Berger and Owen's (1988) taxonomy as a framework, onecould speculate that the energy demand of a typical soccer game has alarger aerobic component than the average singles tennis match and thatthis caused the group differences in positive well-being. In any case, moreresearch is required to further examine differences in mood responses toteam and individual sport.

We were surprised that neither the aerobic dance or competitive sportconditions generated reductions in psychological distress as assessed onthe SEES, This contradicts the large body of literature demonstrating thatexercise reduces negative psychological constructs such as anxiety anddepression (North et al,, 1990; Petruzzello et al,, 1991), Also, thesefindings are contradictory to previous research employing the SEES, Atleast two previous studies have shown that acute exercise reduces psycho-logical distress and fatigue as assessed by the SEES (McAuley & Coumeya,1994; Lox & Rudolph, 1994), To examine whether the baseline levels ofpsychological distress and fatigue in the current sample differed fromprevious research, we compared the present findings to data reported byLox and Rudolph (1994) and found equivalent values. Therefore, no flooreffects were preventing significant reductions in psychological distress orfatigue.

Another possible explanation might be that the translation of theSEES into Korean resulted in reductions in the sensitivity of the psycho-logical distress and fatigue dimensions in a physical activity setting.However, the correlational analyses suggest that the pre- and post-taskrelationships among the dimensions of the SEES are in a Korean sampleare very similar to those generated in North American samples. Clearly,more research is needed to determine the ability of the SEES to tapchanges in negative affect across populations and physical activity set-tings. Interestingly, the baseline levels of positive well-being in Lox andRudolph's study were higher (21,1) than in the current study (17,2),

Rudolph & Kim PHYSICAL ACTIVITY AND MOOD 849

However, the increase in positive well-being in aerobic dancers andsoccer players in the current study were equivalent to Lox and Rudolph'ssample of aerobic dancers.

It should be noted that the current study was limited by the employ-ment of intact groups. Future research might extend this study by ran-domly assigning participants to traditional aerobic exercise groups andrecreational sport groups to further examine mood responses to thesedifferent physical activities. These preliminary findings are encouragingand possess practical relevance. They suggest that the psychologicalbenefits of participating in recreational team sports are equivalent to thatof more traditional aerobic exercise.

This is particularly valuable information for those individuals whodislike monotonous repetitive physical activities and are looking foralternatives that generate similar mental health benefits,

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Bosscher, R,J, (1993), Running and mixed physical exercises with depressedpsychiatric patients, IntemationalJournat of Sport Psychology, 24,170-184,

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