Children who live in countries where school uniforms are the norm appear to be less active than those who don’t, possibly because the clothing restricts their movement
By Christa Lesté-Lasserre
15 February 2024
School uniforms may restrict movement, making children less active
Dan Kenyon/Getty Images
Wearing a uniform to school has been linked to young children getting insufficient amounts of exercise, particularly girls.
With many children missing the World Health Organization (WHO) recommendation of at least 60 minutes of exercise per day, Mairead Ryan at the University of Cambridge and her colleagues decided to look into why.
They analysed existing data about the physical activity levels of more than 1 million children aged 5 to 17 years old from 135 countries and territories, which they compared with the results of their own online survey on how common school uniforms are in these places.
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Overall, boys were 1.5 times more likely than girls to meet the WHO recommendation for physical activity. But that gap is nearly twice as great among younger children who live in places where school uniforms are the norm, says Ryan.
Among secondary school students (generally aged 11 to 17), uniforms didn’t appear to be linked to any sex-related differences in physical activity. However, in primary schools (aged 5 to 10), the gap between girls and boys was 9.8 percentage points in areas where at least 50 per cent of schools required uniforms, compared with 5.5 percentage points where such requirements were lower.