Fewer young men playing sports due to economic recovery

People are struggling to fit sporting activities alongside their jobs following the recent economic recovery, leading to a dip in participation levels, a new report finds.

The Irish Sports Monitor report for 2015 shows that 45 per cent of the 8,500 people interviewed across the country are actively participating in sport, compared with a high of 47.2 per cent in 2013.

This indicates that about 1.6 million Irish adults over the age of 16 regularly play sports and exercise.

The decline is most pronounced in the 25 to 35 age category for men, a trend that has been ascribed to rising employment figures, with that particular cohort finding it difficult to balance personal and work life.

Participation rates have steadily dropped from 67.7 per cent among that age group of males in 2011 to 58 per cent last year, but younger people aged between 16 and 24 are reporting higher participation rates across the board.

Expressed concern

The report is a biannual publication written by polling firm Ipsos MRBI on behalf of national sporting authority Sport Ireland, whose chief executive John Treacy expressed concern about the impact of the recovery on activity levels.

“We never want to see numbers declining,” he said at the publication of the report.

“But the report clearly says the economy is having an impact in terms of people being busier and the men between 25 and 35 are the ones that are mainly affected by this, that’s where the downturn is. Obviously, we have to reverse that and get it back up again,” he added.

However, Mr Treacy noted an “extremely encouraging” development whereby increasing numbers of young women are participating in sports, saying that other countries would be envious of Ireland’s performance in that regard.

Personal exercise remains the most popular form of sporting activity among the general population, with soccer the most played team sport, followed by Gaelic football and hurling/camogie.

Welcoming the findings, Minister of State for Sport Patrick O’Donovan encouraged a “seamless transition” between play and sporting participation for young children.

Early stage

“Sport doesn’t just happen for a young person when they’re able to do it independently.

“For me the transition from play at an early stage for an infant right into adolescence and into adulthood, that transition needs to be seamless. We need to have the facilities and the programmes in place at a national and a local level to do that,” he said.

Elsewhere, the proportion of Irish people living a sedentary lifestyle involving little or no exercise dropped to 12.1 per cent last year, the lowest level recorded since the monitoring process began in 2007.

Ipsos research director Kieran O’Leary added that the gender divide has narrowed across sports, including in the area of cycling for transport.