Physical activity, physical fitness, and grade point average in tertiary students: A meta-analysis

We conducted a meta-analysis of correlations between physical activity, physical fitness, and academic performance among tertiary students. Results with 96 samples showed a great degree of heterogeneity, with credibility intervals being consistent with both a strong negative and strong positive association for many predictor and outcome measures. Thus, there was a great degree of uncertainty in our effect size estimates, and we conclude that much further research is needed on this topic. Nevertheless, we found a small positive association (ρ = 0.03, k = 69, N = 91,003) between physical activity frequency and grade point average (GPA). The association was slightly stronger when the predictor was physical fitness rather than physical activity frequency (ρ = 0.16, k = 13, N = 15,358), when GPA was obtained from institutional records (ρ = 0.11, k = 15, N = 5414), and when physical activity frequency was captured objectively (ρ = 0.20, k = 4, N = 6888), although such moderator analyses were based on a limited number of studies. Only the physical fitness-GPA correlation showed credibility intervals suggesting the correlation was positive in most cases. We could not confirm the presence of publication bias.