Hamish Rogers was the Sport Development Special Projects Consultant at Sport New Zealand and Editor of www.balanceisbetter.org.nz. Outside of work, he's a mediocre football player, a sometimes coach, and a new father. 

A recently published New Zealand study has found that participation in organised sport provides wellbeing benefits to young people, above and beyond the benefits derived from other recreational physical activities.  

In this article, we take a deeper look into this research and consider some of the implications for Balance is Better readers.  

Is all physical activity equally good for your wellbeing?  

It might seem like semantics, but it’s a question worth pondering. Let us explain.  

To begin, let’s set aside the fact that some physical activity is better than none (proof of this later).   

This leaves two variables left to explore:  

1. Duration of activity  

1. Type of activity  

A food analogy…  

If we draw a comparison to how we think about food, we might think of duration of activity as the quantity of food consumed, and the type of activity as (you guessed it) the different foods you can consume.  

So what do we know about food when it comes to our wellbeing?  

Well we know that both the types of food we consume and the amount of food we consume can have a positive impact and a negative impact on our wellbeing. That is:  

• The right amount of food sustains our energy requirements, too much can make us obese, too little and we starve.  

• Some types of foods are a better source of nutrients than others for supporting our bodies vital wellbeing needs. 

Link here to read the full SportNZ Article 

The key messages to take home  

1. When it comes to young people’s wellbeing any physical activity is better than none.  

1. Sport has the potential to provide additional wellbeing benefits for young people above and beyond just general physical activity. Obviously, at an individual level this assumes that quality of sport experience is positive.  

1. Most sport will facilitate some form of connection and community. However, quality sport experiences are critical for enabling the fullest wellbeing benefits from sport to be realised. This means while sport has potential to achieve great wellbeing outcomes for young people, for this to be harnessed, we need to care about what goes into the making of a quality sport experience (e.g. coaches, programme design, etc.). 

Read the full article:  The Value of Sport: Wellbeing Benefits of Sport Participation during Adolescence 

Photo by Fitsum Admasu on Unsplash 

Article added: Saturday 26 April 2025