Exercise addiction in team sports

A systematic literature review

Datos Bibliográficos

ID21391780
AutoresBhavya Chhabra (0000-0002-8309-3171, Institute of Health Promotion and Sport Sciences, Faculty of Education and Psychology ELTE Eötvös Loránd University Budapest Hungary), Merve Denizci Nazlıgül (0000-0002-6516-7341, Clinical Psychologist and Independent Researcher Istanbul Turkey), Attila Szabó (0000-0001-7833-8894, Institute of Health Promotion and Sport Sciences, Faculty of Education and Psychology ELTE Eötvös Loránd University Budapest Hungary)
Año2024
Volumen65
Número5
Páginas846-857
Fecha de publicación2024-10-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaScandinavian Journal of Psychology (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0036-5564 • E-ISSN: 1467-9450
EditorialWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/sjop.13026
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas1
Referencias citadas62

While regular exercise should be part of the contemporary lifestyle, many people overindulge in it to the point of losing control over their behavior. This condition is known as exercise addiction (EA). Although addiction is an individual phenomenon, and most of the over 1,000 published studies on EA look at individual exercisers, there are studies on team sports athletes, too. Theoretically, these athletes should not manifest exercise addiction, but some studies are projecting the contrary. Therefore, in this literature review, we analyze EA in team athletes. Based on four databases (PsycINFO, SPORTDiscus, Web of Science, and Google Scholar), we located 22 articles conforming to inclusion criteria. These studies suggest a high risk of exercise addiction among team sports participants. While the figures are lower than for individual exercisers, they are in discord with the concept of addiction as a dysfunction, and the lack of a single case of exercise addiction reported (to date) in team sports athletes in the academic literature. In agreement with a recent position paper, we conclude that there are substantial conceptual and measurement errors in exercise addiction research