Prevalence of Primary and Secondary Exercise Dependence and Its Correlation with Drive for Thinness in Practitioners of Different Sports and Physical Activities

Abstract

Relatively few studies directly compared the prevalence of exercise dependence (EXD) in different sports. Different conceptualizations and measures of EXD limit the possibility of comparing results from different studies. In this study, we measured the prevalence of EXD and its correlation with drive for thinness (DT) in four different categories of sports and exercise. Participants were 427 people engaging in endurance sports, esthetic sports, team sports, or fitness activities. The Exercise Dependence Scale was adopted to measure EXD; the Drive for Thinness scale was used to measure DT and to distinguish between primary and secondary EXD. Results suggested that none of the considered sport categories seems to be more at risk for EXD than the other ones. A correlation between EXD and DT was found in the fitness group, suggesting, together with previous literature, that EXD could be related to the reward a person strives to achieve trough exercising.