The Impact of Physical Activity on Health Care Student Academic Performance in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

Background: It is assumed that the students of health care colleges have a greater knowledge about healthy lifestyle and dietary habits when compared to other students. The main goal of this study was to determine the prevalence and effect of exercise on the academic performance of the health care students. Materials and methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted on 376 male healthcare students at King Saud University in Riyadh from Colleges of Medicine, Dentistry and Pharmacy in the period from December 2014 until March 2015. The study population was selected by multistage random sampling. A self-administered questionnaire was used for data collection. A pilot study was conducted to test its feasibility. A statistical package for the social sciences (SPSS) version 21.0 was used for data analysis. Results: 56.6% of the subjects were found to be physically active. Those who did not perform exercise, lack of time (55.8%) and lack of interest (36.2%) appeared to be the two most common causes for not exercising. The effect of physical activity on academic performance was found to be statistically significant in only two domains which were being less likely to be being late to the classes (P.026) and relatively better concentration during lectures (P.001). Conclusion: The study included that a significant positive effect of exercise was found on two domains of academic performance, namely better concentration in classes and punctuality in attending lectures, but with no significant effect on GPA of students.