About me
I graduated in Psychology at Umeå University in 2015. My research interests have since then shifted towards the link between physical activity/exercise and mental health. Partly, on the basis of what influence physical activity and exercise have on psychological well being reaching over both long and short term time-spans, and partly how we should work to make people with a sedentary lifestyle to change their behavioural patterns so that they become more physically active.
Sport activities impact on social integration and health development in newly arrived refugees
The Swedish National Board of Health estimates that between 20-30% of newly arrived refugees suffer from some type of mental issues. Escapeing from countries at war can create traumatic experiences and combined with the uncertainties of living in a new country it can create mental health issues. Research shows that physical activity and being in organized leaisure activities fosters young people's psychosocial health. Research also show that physical activity has a positive correlations with school performance and working memory. Adolescents engaged in organized leisure activities also exhibits better psychosocial health and fewer risk behaviors compared with those with low commitment in organized leisure activities. The Swedish government has, starting in 2016, invested about 65 million annually to promote sports related projects aiming to, among other things, social integrations. Private foundations and other organizations have also invested in sports related integration efforts.
This project aims to study psychosocial health development and perceived social integration in newly arrived refugee adolecents engaged in sports programmes. The project is divided into three parts. Part one is an interview study aiming to find out how the opportunities to play sports are perceived by the participants? Part two is a longitudinal mixed methods study that aims to answer whether there are measurable health development and social integration changes for refugee adolescents taking part in sports programmes? Part three is a "diary study" aiming to study the lengths of the effects sport activities has on the perceived stress, mood and sleep. Data will collected with time intensive one item survey data of perceived daily stress and mood, combined with 24 hour "objective" measurements of physical activity and sleep. Follow-up interviews will increase understanding of the data.