Barriers to initiating and maintaining participation
43% who register never participate in a parkrun event
A new BMC Public Health research article
Abstract
Interventions that increase population physical activity are required to promote health and wellbeing. parkrun delivers community-based, 5 km events worldwide yet 43% who register never participate in a parkrun event. This research had two objectives; i) explore the demographics of people who register for parkrun in United Kingdom, Australia, Ireland, and don’t initiate or maintain participation ii) understand the barriers to participating in parkrun amongst these people. Mandatory data at parkrun registration provided demographic characteristics of parkrun registrants. A bespoke online survey distributed across the three countries captured the reasons for not participating or only participating once. Of 680,255 parkrun registrants between 2017 and 19, 293,542 (43%) did not participate in any parkrun events and 147,148 (22%) only participated in one parkrun event. Females, 16–34 years and physically inactive were more likely to not participate or not return to parkrun. Inconvenient start time was the most frequently reported barrier to participating, with females more likely than males to report the psychological barrier of feeling too unfit to participate. Co-creating strategies with and for people living with a chronic disease, women, young adults, and physically inactive people, could increase physical activity participation within parkrun.
Conclusions and future research
This study acknowledges the population reach of parkrun across Australia, Ireland and the United Kingdom but also reinforces inequalities in participation. Individuals aged 16–34, females and those who were physically inactive were more likely to not participate or not return to parkrun having completed one event. Bridging the gap between parkrun registration and attending once was a significant issue amongst younger females and physically inactive at the point of registration with parkrun. Overall, inconvenient start time was the most frequently reported barrier to participating amongst parkrun registrants, with women more likely than men to report the psychological barrier of feeling too unfit to participate. Co-creating strategies with and for people living with a chronic disease, women, and young adults physically inactive people, could increase physical activity participation within parkrun. Further in-depth qualitative work that elicits rich community experiences could also be beneficial.
Source
L. J. Reece, K. Owen, M. Graney, C. Jackson, M. Shields, G. Turner & C. Wellington
BMC Public Health
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