The Effect of Physical Education Goal Orientations and Enjoyment in Adolescent Physical Activity: A Parallel Process Latent Growth Analysis

The study examined, first, the longitudinal development and, second, the longitudinal relationships between students' physical education (PE) goal orientations, enjoyment, and physical activity (PA) participation across Grades 7 to 9. The study comprised 812 Finnish adolescents (age range: 12-13) who responded to questionnaires three times during their middle school years. Latent growth models showed that adolescents' task and ego orientations were stable, whereas their PE enjoyment and PA declined. A parallel process latent growth analysis showed a positive relationship between the growth trajectories of task orientation and enjoyment and of PE enjoyment and PA. Mediation processes using parallel process latent growth modeling showed that PE enjoyment is an important factor in understanding the relationship between task orientation in PE and PA. The findings of this study suggest that task orientation and enjoyment in PE are salient factors inhibiting the observed decline in PA.