Why do we do sports?

One of the most obvious and predictable answers could be that we engage in sports to feel good and stay healthy. But is it always like that? Could there be other reasons for doing sports?

Several authors have addressed and studied the different motivations behind our participation in sports. They mainly discuss intrinsic and extrinsic motives.

The former are related to personal enjoyment and satisfaction, while the latter involve external rewards or incentives.

When there's an internal motivation, sports are pursued because they are perceived as gratifying and stimulating activities. This may be due to a love or calling for the game, personal challenges that can be faced, or the inherent fun in the sport itself.

In cases of external motivation, sports are not perceived as rewarding activities but are done to gain a prize, social recognition, to avoid punishments, or meet external expectations.

But are there individuals more susceptible to having an extrinsic motive than an intrinsic one? And vice versa?

According to Craft et al. (2014), the majority of people who engage in sports for extrinsic reasons are women, while men are generally more physically active for intrinsic reasons.

In the case of women, sociocultural pressures to engage in physical activity stand out, as they create a sense of obligation to move and meet beauty and normative physical appearance standards, often seeking thinness.

This is why adherence to sports practice is lower in women because there is a certain relationship between the motive for practice and adherence (Anić, P., Pokrajac-Bulian, A., & Mohorić, T., 2022).

This leads to a situation where half of the population (women) is focused on pursuing a normative or socially accepted body, engaging in sports intermittently and punitively while having a poor relationship with their bodies and sports.

This is how an activity that could be rewarding and enjoyable and could provide physical and mental health benefits turns into a punishment, and a source of general discomfort.

What is the role of food companies, especially in the fitness industry, in light of this reality?

Large food companies take advantage of these vulnerable and victimized individuals, to some extent, by social pressure and standards, to sell their products with impossible and fraudulent claims, creating a market niche dominated by vulnerable individuals to whom they offer suspiciously miraculous solutions.

These companies not only play on the desperation of their potential customers but can also put their physical health at risk. One of the clearest examples was documented by Manso, G., et al. (2011), and Jurčić, D., et al. (2019), where they studied cases potentially linking the consumption of a popular herbal dietary supplement to hepatotoxicity and liver damage.

All of this underscores the significant responsibility on the part of authorities to 1) promote physical activity and sports from a perspective of well-being, pleasure, and physical and mental health, 2) provide simple and truthful information about nutrition and food, 3) promote critical and analytical thinking regarding the claims and marketing strategies of food products, and companies in the food sector must comply with safety regulations and ensure the complete quality and transparency of the products they develop.