Gibberish in Communicating Written Physical Activity Information: Making Strides at Derailing a Perpetual Problem

Abstract

The majority of physical activity resources are too difficult to be easily read and understood by most U.S. adults. Attempts to ensure that such resources are written in the most accessible manner possible have been advanced (e.g., 2010 U.S.National Action Plan to Improve Health Literacy). For this study, physical activity educational resources were collected through the Internet (N = 163), and their reading grade levels were analyzed. Over 50% of the resources were written at an unsatisfactory level, with the observed reading grade level being greater than eighth-grade (M = 8.98,SD = 2.92,p < .001, 95% CI [8.53, 9.43]), the maximum recommended. Suggestions for future research and publicly engaged sociology of sport praxis are discussed, with a focus on increasing the equity of written physical activity educational resources.