Overview
- Published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, the synthesis pooled 57 depression meta-analyses (800 studies; 57,930 participants) and 24 for anxiety (258 studies; 19,368 participants), reporting standardized mean differences of -0.61 for depression and -0.47 for anxiety.
- Aerobic activities such as running, walking, swimming, and dancing showed the largest effects; supervised and group formats were most effective for depression, while shorter, lower-intensity programs were most associated with anxiety relief.
- The strongest improvements were observed in adults aged 18–30 and in postnatal women, with beneficial effects seen across other age groups as well.
- Effect sizes compared favorably with those reported in prior reviews for antidepressants and psychotherapies, spurring calls to integrate tailored exercise prescriptions into routine care and public-health guidance.
- Authors and experts flagged limits including low or critically low AMSTAR-2 ratings for many source reviews, heterogeneous definitions of intensity and duration, and sparse anxiety data for some populations, highlighting the need for higher-quality, longer-term, head-to-head research.