The profiling of university of Ljubljana students according to their motives for exercise participation
Article Category: Original scientific article
Published Online: Feb 26, 2017
Page range: 107 - 114
Received: Aug 15, 2015
Accepted: Sep 14, 2016
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/sjph-2017-0014
Keywords
© National Institute of Public Health, Slovenia
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.
Introduction
The main research objective is the analysis of the grouping of the students of the University of Ljubljana, with respect to the intensity of different types of exercise participation motives, their gender, discipline and year of study, level of physical activity, status of physical education class, organization of physical activities during study, and place of residence.
Methods
Data were collected using personal data sheets during enrolling students at the University of Ljubljana. Students completed The Exercise Motivations Inventory (EMI-2), with additional data about sociodemographic parameters.
Results
The results reveal that the students could be grouped in three distinctive clusters, which can be very clearly explained in terms of the prevalence of exercise participation motives in general. The students grouped in the first cluster have the lowest average values (means) in all exercise participation motives. The students grouped in the second cluster have the profile with moderate means in all exercise participation motives, while the students grouped in the third cluster have the profile with the highest means in all exercise participation motives.
Conclusions
The results indicate overall higher motivation for physical activity in men. All the sub-samples are different in their relevant features used in clustering (e.g., male students are dominant in life sciences, etc.), which provide a guide both for the explanation of the results obtained and for practical implications.