Comparison of attention levels in children who do and do not do sports in adolescence

This study aims to compare the sustained attention levels between adolescent children who participate in sports and those who do not. The research was conducted on a total of 254 adolescents aged between 13 and 17, who are enrolled in various schools in Istanbul, including both those who regularly participate in sports and those who do not. During the data collection process, standard psychometric tests such as the Bourdon Attention Test were used to objectively measure the students' attention levels. The collected data were analyzed using SPSS 22.0 software. After determining the percentage values of the frequency distributions of the data, skewness and kurtosis values were examined to confirm a normal distribution. Subsequently, t-tests and one-way ANOVA were applied. The relationship between continuous variables such as age and grade with Bourdon scale scores was examined using Pearson correlation analysis. A confidence interval of 95% was accepted for the analyses (p=0.05). The results of the research analyses indicated that students who participate in sports perform better in attention tests. The group that engages in sports obtained better results, particularly in tasks requiring prolonged attention and in environments with numerous distractors. These findings suggest that regular physical activity, especially during adolescence, plays a supportive and enhancing role in attention processes.