Psychological health and squash play

Abstract

Regular participation in exercise is believed to promote psychological well-being. In recent years squash has become a popular mode of exercise. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between squash play and certain indices of psychological health.

Body concepts, psychosomatic health and type-A behaviour were examined in three groups varying in squash playing ability. The three groups consisted of sedentary (non-exercising) subjects, recreational squash players with a playing frequency of once per week, and county standard players. Each subject completed a batch of five questionnaires: Body Consciousness, Physical Self-Efficacy, Health Opinion Survey, Spielberger Trait Anxiety and the Bortner Type-A Scale.

Cross-sectional comparisons showed that the more favourable health profiles tended to belong to the county group, least favourable to the sedentary. This trend was not evident in all the measures. Type-A behaviour, for example, was most pronounced in the county group, suggesting that the personality type associated with coronary risk was found at the higher levels of play.

Keywords:

• Squash
• Body concepts
• Psychological health
• Type-A behaviour