Physical activity and stress resilience: Considering those at-risk for developing mental health problems

• We examine PA, self-perceived stress resilience, and trait anxiety.
• PA and resilience were associated in individuals with high trait anxiety.
• No significant relationship emerged in those with low and moderate trait anxiety.
• Protective effects of PA may depend on individual differences in trait anxiety.

IntroductionPhysical activity (PA) has been shown to benefit mental health. While research on non-human animal species indicates that PA may confer protective effects on mental health by increasing resilience to stress via regulation of the stress response, the human literature offers inconsistent evidence regarding this idea. To help reconcile these inconsistencies, the present study of human adults tested the hypothesis that PA's protective effects, as indexed by self-perceived resilience, vary according to individual differences in trait anxiety, which has been linked to a dysregulated stress response and risk for developing mental health problems. Specifically, we predicted that individuals reporting high trait anxiety (and thus presumably more stress response dysregulation) would show a stronger association between PA and self-perceived resilience, than would peers with lower reported trait anxiety.MethodsUndergraduate students (n = 222) completed online self-report measures regarding their PA level, trait anxiety, and self-perceived resilience.ResultsHierarchical linear regression analyses yielded evidence of a significant interaction between trait anxiety level and PA, such that PA and self-perceived resilience were significantly and positively associated among individuals with high trait anxiety, but not among individuals with low and moderate trait anxiety.DiscussionIn conclusion, individuals with high trait anxiety, which may be a risk factor for developing clinically significant mental health problems, may preferentially show psychological, as well as physiological, benefits from PA.