Bouncing back or staying inactive? The social inequality in sport participation before, during and after the COVID-pandemic.

This contribution addresses the development of educational and financial inequality in sport participation in the Netherlands over the course of the COVID-pandemic. More specifically, we deal with the issue whether increased educational and financial inequality during the COVID-pandemic is temporary or becomes permanent after relaxation of the COVID-measures. We expected lower educated and people with financial problems to have less resources to bounce back to sport participation or to continue sport participation in sport over the course of the COVID-pandemic. To test our expectations, we performed multinominal logistic regression analyses on longitudinal data from the Dutch LISS-panel (n = 1.157). Our results confirmed that higher educated more often bounced back in their sport participation after COVID. Lower educated and people with financial problems were more likely to completely dropout. Our main conclusion is that educational and financial inequality in sport participation further increased after relaxation of the COVID-measures. This study enhances the understanding of the long-term impact of the COVID-pandemic on inequality in sport participation, and that might lead to more intensified sport promotion policies. Ongoing attention of policymakers for vulnerable groups is required to tackle social inequality in sport participation enlarged by the COVID-pandemic.

Sport club dropout under COVID-19 in the Netherlands: do characteristics of the neighbourhood matter?

Sport is considered important to mitigate social and health problems related to the COVID-19 pandemic and thus contributes to a resilient society. Because of poverty, caring responsibilities, social isolation and/or health issues, caused or reinforced by the COVID-19 pandemic, (too) high thresholds may be experienced lowering sports club participation. In this article, we study dropout from sports club membership among the Dutch population in COVID times and relate it to neighbourhood characteristics to determine whether inequality in sports behaviour is increasing or decreasing. Specifically, we analyse changes in the association to sport clubs by utilizing membership register data of the National Sport Federation in the Netherlands (NOC*NSF). This longitudinal information on 3.6 million club members in 2019 within Dutch sport federations was used to analyse developments at the individual level between 2019 (pre-COVID) and 2021. Based on register information on the area of residence of sporters, neighbourhood characteristics were added to these individual membership data. Our results display that the socioeconomic status of a member's neighbourhood and the sport infrastructure in this neighbourhood impacts the likelihood of dropping out of a sport club of both youths and adults during the COVID-19 pandemic. Dropout among members is lower in higher socioeconomic status neighbourhoods and in neighbourhoods with abundant sport facilities. Remarkably, the impact of these living environment features seems higher for youth than for adults. To conclude, our study enhances a further understanding of inequalities in sport club membership dropout during COVID-19. First, it may inform policy makers to intensify sport promotion policies and to especially support sport clubs in lower status neighbourhoods. Second, given the relatively high dropout rates during the COVID-19 pandemic particular attention for retention seems necessary.

The Impact of the Built Environment and Social Environment on Physical Activity: A Scoping Review.

This scoping review aims to provide an overview of the current state of physical activity research, focusing on the interplay between built and social environments and their respective influences on physical activity. We comprehensively searched electronic databases to identify relevant studies published between 2000 and 2022. A total of 35 articles have been reviewed based on the research question. The review found that built and social environments influence physical activity, and consideration of people's perceptions of their surroundings can provide further insight. The literature was summarized, and recommendations were made for future research. Findings suggest that interventions targeting built and social environments can promote physical activity effectively. However, limitations in the literature exist, including a need for more standardization in research methods and consistency in measurement tools.

Does the COVID-pandemic affect the educational and financial inequality in weekly sport participation in the Netherlands?

This paper explores the impact of the COVID-pandemic on educational and financial inequality in level of weekly sport participation in the Netherlands. Restrictions due to the COVID-pandemic resulted in several barriers for people to continue sport participation. Lower educated people and individuals with financial problems are expected to have relatively few resources to adapt to the COVID restrictions, and therefore, more likely will decrease their level of weekly sport participation. Using high-quality data from the Dutch Longitudinal Internet Studies for the Social Sciences (LISS) panel, we are able to compare individual sport behaviour before and during the COVID-pandemic. Our findings suggest that the level of weekly sport participation of lower educated people and individuals with financial problems decreased more strongly during the COVID-pandemic. This implies that indeed the COVID-pandemic resulted in increasing educational and financial inequality in sport participation. With these results, our study contributes to a body of knowledge on the broader societal impact of COVID on issues of social exclusion. It may also inform policymakers to critically assess and intensify sport promotion policies directed at vulnerable groups in society.

Is Working from Home during COVID-19 Associated with Increased Sports Participation? Contexts of Sports, Sports Location and Socioeconomic Inequality.

Previous research has focused mainly on the association between working from home (WFH) and physical activity, establishing that physical activity diminished among people WFH during the COVID-19 pandemic. In our study, we investigated the association between WFH and specifically sports participation (competitive and non-competitive). We theorized that WFH would offer individuals additional opportunities to practice sports during the pandemic. Governmental restrictions at the time constrained opportunities to participate in organized sports and in sports with others. We, therefore, expected sports participation during the pandemic to be largely restricted to individual participation and participation at home or in the public space. By means of descriptive analyses and adjusted analyses of variance (n = 1506), we found positive associations between WFH and various aspects of sports participation. Lower-educated individuals, in particular, seem to be benefiting from WFH related to their sports participation in the public space, and economically deprived individuals also seem to be benefiting from WFH in regard to their sports participation at home. Our findings extend the literature on physical activity and sports participation among people who worked from home during the COVID-19 pandemic while offering implications for policies on WFH, sports opportunities in public space and physical activity-friendly environments.