Prevalence of the risk of exercise addiction based on a new classification: a cross-sectional study in 15 countries

Chhabra, B., Granziol, U., Griffiths, M.D. ORCID: 0000-0001-8880-6524, Zandonai, T., Landolfi, E., Solmi, M., Zou, L., Yang, P., Lichtenstein, M.B., Stoll, O., Akimoto, T., Cantù-Berrueto, A., Larios, A., Egorov, A.Y., de la Vega Marcos, R., Alpay, M., Nazlıgül, M.D., Yildirim, M., Trott, M., Portman, R.M. and Szabo, A., 2024. Prevalence of the risk of exercise addiction based on a new classification: a cross-sectional study in 15 countries. International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction. ISSN 1557-1874

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Abstract

Exercise addiction is widely studied, but an official clinical diagnosis does not exist for this behavioral addiction. Earlier research using various screening instruments examined the absolute scale values while investigating the disorder. The Exercise Addiction Inventory-3 (EAI-3) was recently developed with two subscales, one denoting health-relevant exercise and the other addictive tendencies. The latter has different cutoff values for leisure exercisers and elite athletes. Therefore, the present 15-country study (n = 3,760) used the EAI-3 to classify the risk of exercise addiction (REA), but only if the participant reported having had a negative exercise-related experience. Based on this classification, the prevalence of REA was 9.5% in the sample. No sex differences, and few cross-national differences were found. However, collectivist countries reported greater REA in various exercise contexts than individualist countries. Moreover, the REA among athletes was (i) twice as high as leisure exercisers, (ii) higher in organized than self-planned exercises, irrespective of athletic status, and (iii) higher among those who exercised for skill/mastery reasons than for health and social reasons, again irrespective of athletic status. Eating disorders were more frequent among REA-affected individuals than in the rest of the sample. These results do not align with recent theoretical arguments claiming that exercise addiction is unlikely to be fostered in organized sports. The present study questions the current research framework for understanding exercise addiction and offers a new alternative to segregate self-harming exercise from passionate overindulgence in athletic life.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction
Creators:	Chhabra, B., Granziol, U., Griffiths, M.D., Zandonai, T., Landolfi, E., Solmi, M., Zou, L., Yang, P., Lichtenstein, M.B., Stoll, O., Akimoto, T., Cantù-Berrueto, A., Larios, A., Egorov, A.Y., de la Vega Marcos, R., Alpay, M., Nazlıgül, M.D., Yildirim, M., Trott, M., Portman, R.M. and Szabo, A.
Publisher:	Springer
Date:	12 June 2024
ISSN:	1557-1874
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.1007/s11469-024-01322-z DOI 1903634 Other
Rights:	© the author(s) 2024. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
Divisions:	Schools > School of Social Sciences
Record created by:	Jonathan Gallacher
Date Added:	13 Jun 2024 13:51
Last Modified:	13 Jun 2024 13:51
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/51561

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