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Mood is a much-studied and often measured concept in sport and exercise psychology, but the elusive and complex foundations of moods' philosophical meanings are rarely explained. In the following, these two different analytical approaches (psychological, philosophical) to mood are briefly described.

Conceptualizations of mood are similar in the parent discipline of psychology and sport and exercise psychology (e.g., Ekkekakis, 2013). While emotion is typically short, intense, and “about something” (i.e., emotions are always a response to a specific stimulus), mood has a longer duration, is of lower intensity, and does not need to be about anything in particular (Ekkekakis, 2013). Moods are primarily seen as indicators of psychological disturbance or well-being, and almost always as a reaction of the individual to the world outside.

On the other hand, in philosophy, there is a more existentialist perspective to the understanding of mood and its constitutive role in human lives. From this perspective experiencing moods is not only a reaction to encounters of our daily going-about, but rather part of the individual's constructive access to the world: Mood is the basic mode through which the world discloses itself to us, and how we experience the world (Freeman, 2014). Drawing on Heidegger, Ratcliffe (2013) suggested that “moods constitute how we find ourselves in the world” (p. 157) or “belong to a world” (p. 158). Moods are neither simple inner psychological states, nor “out there” in the world. They are something “in-between,” giving us “a sense of being part of a world that is pre-subjective and pre-objective” (Ratcliffe, 2013, p. 157).

According to this philosophical perspective, moods concern the way we are practically immersed in our world, and what we find important or irrelevant. These matterings are shaped by cultural webs of significance, such as how sport and exercise are generally understood in our cultural environment. Action and world are interwoven by moods. The COVID-19 pandemic has likely changed the existential background of our lives, which in turn is likely to affect the way we are and feel in this “new world.”

Despite the different ways of how mood has been conceptualized in philosophy and how measures of mood have been used in psychological research, the two perspectives may also be related to each other. Empirical studies showed that aerobic as well as resistance exercise may both have acute and long-term positive effects on mood (Berger and Motl, 2000; Chase and Hutchinson, 2015). It has been emphasized, however, that some individuals may experience little or no psychological benefits due to situational, personal, or activity-related other factors (Rocheleau et al., 2004). For example, individuals who do not exercise regularly might experience only limited improvement in their mood from a bout of exercise compared to trained individuals (Hoffman and Hoffman, 2008). Findings like these highlighted that mood is connected to our already established relationship with exercise and is not a simple, automatic response to physical exertion.

This is further supported by findings from the international study of which this study is a part (Brand et al., 2020). Exercise frequency before the COVID-related lockdown was a protective factor for mood during it, in the way that those who only started during the lockdown and exercised infrequently did not report better mood. Expectations about the outcomes from exercise, stemming from previous personal experiences and cultural frameworks of meaning surrounding exercise, seem to play a role in how an exercise session impacts mood (Anderson and Brice, 2011; Mothes et al., 2017). In contrast to popular beliefs, the “feel good” effect of exercise is not automatic, but there can be marked interindividual differences in how we experience exercise and how it impacts our well-being (Ekkekakis and Brand, 2019).

Earlier psychological studies already sought to investigate whether different types of exercise, typically aerobic or resistance training, are differentially related to mood outcomes (e.g., Chase and Hutchinson, 2015). In contrast to these earlier studies, we choose the more philosophically-informed theoretical perspective. We are interested in whether and how different ways of exercising might offer different ways of relating to the world or “worldmaking” (Breivik, 2020).

Breivik focused on participation in sports as a way of exploring the environing world and one's possibilities. He proposed that different sporting activities (e.g., running on the track, playing football, boxing, and kayaking) operate on different primary, ontological relationships that are constitutive of these activities. The relations were termed “I–Me,” “I–You,” “I–Society,” and “I–Nature.” According to Breivik, they are the basis for involvement in sporting activities and contribute to the individual's “worldmaking.” We believe that this framework can be applied to noncompetitive physical exercise as well.

The I–Me relation refers to our own relationship with ourselves and how we find out about our capabilities and limitations through involvement in sport and exercise. Related to competitive sports, this comes with questions like: How fast can I run? How far can I throw? How much can I lift? In the exercising context, respective questions may be: Can I increase my physical fitness? Can I shape my body? In the I-Me relation, the subject remains his or her own reference point. The focus is on exploring and extending one's boundaries and possibilities, while the presence of others is not necessary for the activity to be pursued. Most typically, this relation ideally manifests in individual sports, such as athletics, gymnastics, or weightlifting; however, it is also relevant to non-competitive activities, and even group exercise classes, when the activity is meant to relate to one's personal concerns first of all (e.g., health, body shape, strength, endurance; and not in relation to other participants).

The I–You relation refers to testing ourselves against others in contest or combat, that is, “encounter” sports. Here, the question is about my capacities in relation to your capacities: My cleverness, skill, and strength are measured against yours. The presence of the opponent is a necessity for the activity. Breivik (2020) mentions various martial arts, table tennis, squash, and badminton as examples. Importantly, the nature of the encounter is of rivalry and conflict (and therefore sports dance is not included in this dimension). One person wins, the other loses. However, both parties may still gain benefits from involvement in these activities, and they may be carried out in a friendly manner (e.g., playing recreational tennis).

The I–Society relation concerns our relation to the collective other: being a team member, belonging to a group. This relation manifests in team sports that offer us possibilities for cooperation (but also conflict) and that we may achieve more together than we can achieve alone. For these activities, the presence of the group or team is a necessity. The lockdowns following the COVID-19 outbreak has likely brought the heaviest disruption for those preferring this type of relating to the world, given that group and team sports exercising and training, as well as competitions, ceased in many countries worldwide.

Finally, I–Nature refers to those activities where human beings explore and experiment with their relationship to the natural world. In contrast to a stadium, gym or sports hall, nature is not a stable and predictable arena for testing one's capacities; it can be uncontrollable and perhaps takes the moving person by surprise. The waves in the sea (for the surfer), snow conditions (for the snowboarder), rain, wind, obstacles, or animals on the path (for the runner) present unanticipated encounters for the moving person. Nature is alive and can be acting on us; but always incidentally, and not intentionally as opponents as in the I–You and I–Society types would.

Breivik (2020) noted that this fourfold framework presents ideal types that cannot always be neatly separated from each other in reality. For example, cycling is an activity that may be experienced by the individual as an I–Me relation (as an individual sport; e.g., a time trial on track), an I–Society relation (team sport; e.g., the Tour de France), or an I–Nature relation (outdoor sport; e.g., mountain biking), or as a combination of all those relations. In addition, not all activities that are carried out in nature necessarily prioritize the I–Nature relation. Citing Howe (2012), Breivik notes that it is possible to approach activities in a “‘nature–instrumental” attitude, where nature is seen simply as the platform for one's self-project (e.g., improving fitness or winning a fell running competition). Approaching an activity with a “nature-directed” attitude, where we place value on connecting and resonating with nature, is different from that. Despite these complications, Breivik (2020) argued that the fourfold framework of I–Me, I–You, I–Society, and I–Nature can help identify what is necessary and sufficient for different sport and exercise activities to be realized. We believe that it can well expand our basic understanding of how we are in the sporting world.

The Nordic region is characterized by strong physical activity, “sport for all,” and outdoor life cultures (Bergsgard et al., 2019). In addition to volunteer-based sport clubs, outdoor physical activity has been an important part of the Nordic movement culture heritage and is enabled by the “everyman's right” of access to both public and private forests (Neuvonen et al., 2018). Finland has a low population density and cities are relatively green compared to many other European cities. Most Finnish people engage in physical activity in outdoor spaces, and it has been found that having access to green spaces improved self-rated health through an increase in participation in outdoor physical activity (Pietilä et al., 2015). However, although Finland ranks high in international comparisons and the level of leisure-time physical activity has increased, more than half of the adult population still does not meet the official recommendations for physical activity (Wennman et al., 2019). Wennman et al. (2019) also reported that young and highly educated adults are more physically active than older and less-educated adults.

A national survey in 2009–2010 (Suomen Kuntoliikuntaliitto, 2010) indicated that most of the top-10 forms of exercise and sport activities (in terms of participation rate) among Finnish adults are self-organized and can be undertaken alone. Thus, in Breivik's (2020) terms, they can be categorized into I–Me or I–Nature activities. Walking (1,790,000 participants), cycling (845,000 participants), and weight training at a gym (713,000) were the three most popular types of exercise in Finnish adults, with cross-country skiing, jogging/running, swimming, gymnastics (including aerobic), and Nordic walking also included in the top-10 activities. In addition to these, only one I–You (badminton) and one I–Society (floorball) activity were included in the top-10. This said, 72% reported that they took part in two or more different types of activities. However, some activities are seasonal (e.g., skiing or skating in the winter, kayaking or orienteering in the summer), and for athletes, their second type of activity (e.g., weight training) might rather represent a necessary means to improve performance in their primary sport.

While the main objective of Breivik's (2020) philosophical discourse was not to categorize different sport and exercise activities into the proposed four basic “relations to the world,” he mentioned that the fourfold framework may be applied in that way in other studies. This is what we tried to do here. Of course, we fully recognize the empirical complications that come with this approach in terms of classifying the different activities, and the challenge of inferring people's intentions from survey data (i.e., whether participants adopted, for example, a nature-instrumental or nature-directed attitude toward their activities). However, since our focus is on continuity and discontinuity in people's behavioral preferences, and not on the analysis of subjective experiences, we find the fourfold framework useful in giving us indication of whether the mode of participants' exercise or sport activities has meaningfully changed in response to the COVID-19-related lockdowns.

We used the Finnish subsample from a larger international study (Brand et al., 2020) as data for our explorations. Following Breivik's (2020) fourfold framework, we categorized the participants' preferred type of relating to the world through sport or exercise, before and during the pandemic. We expected that as a result of the lockdown, many participants who had been involved in indoor exercise and/or group activities before (e.g., an I–Me relation, such as visiting gyms, I–You relations, such as doing martial arts, or I–Society relations, such as playing football), were forced to change their primary mode of engagement. Assuming that such shifting would affect our participants' worldmaking, we explored whether these shifts would indeed affect their moods as measured with a psychological scale. Given the explorative nature of this approach, we did not set up hypotheses about the direction of possible changes.

We analyzed the data of 601 adults aged 18–73 years (227 men, 367 women, 7 other; mean age of the total sample was 41.8 ± 11.4 years) residing in Finland. Most of them had a university master's degree or had received higher education (426), were working full time (447), and reported having a medium or high income (497). An about equal number of participants reported living in an urban (245 participants) or a suburban region (267). Fewer participants reported residing in a rural region (88).

As part of the international study, the Unipark™ web-based survey-software was used for data collection, with Finnish participants being recruited by convenience sampling. We advertised the study and contacted potential participants via social media platforms (Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook), and used the authors' private and professional networks (e.g., email lists). We followed the General Data Protection Regulations (EU) and the American Psychological Association (APA) Ethical Guidelines for Research, and participants provided informed consent prior to the study. The questionnaire was anonymous, and it was also possible to skip questions or stop participating at any point.

Participants entered their primary type of exercise as free text. The first author of this article manually coded and interpreted the answers according to Breivik's four relations I–Me, I–You, I–Society, and I–Nature. For example, participants reported gym, crossfit, and pilates, which were coded as I–Me relations. Examples for I–You are badminton, tennis, and kickboxing; for I–Society, football, volleyball, and ice hockey; for I–Nature, jogging/running, orienteering, and hiking. The coding was reviewed by the third author, and ambiguous cases were discussed and subsequently resolved. The full list of exercise types and how they were coded is available in Table 1 of the Supplementary Material to this article.

We recognized that the distinction between I–Me and I–Nature in particular is ambiguous and requires interpretation. As an example, a jogger in outdoor spaces could be focused on the I–Me relation (i.e., jog solely to improve fitness) or I–Nature relation (i.e., jog to enjoy being outdoors), or conceivably often values both (being in natural environments and improving fitness). Finnish people in cities also typically have access to green spaces for exercising (Pietilä et al., 2015), and nature areas have been reported to be the most common favorite places for Finnish adults (Korpela et al., 2010). We, therefore, classified walking and jogging/running as I–Nature activities, which was further justified by research indicating that being in nature seems to act on us regardless of our intentions e.g., the proximity of green spaces can provide a buffer for stressful life events; Van den Berg et al. (2010). This highlights that we are not merely producing our experiences by intentional activity, but we respond to the world and what is “disclosed” to us (Breivik, 2020).

All variables were checked as to whether they met the requirements for statistical testing (e.g., normal distribution with Shapiro-Wilk tests and by visual inspection of QQ- and density plots, homogeneity of variance with Levene's test). If violated, non-parametric tests were used for further analysis.

The proportions of how many participants remained or shifted from one relation to another were inspected by cross-tabling this information. Main flows were inspected with a Sankey diagram. From this analysis, change groups (e.g., from I–Me before the lockdown to I–Nature during the lockdown), and maintenance groups (e.g., I–Nature before and also during the lockdown) were formed, which we will refer to as continuity/discontinuity patterns.

We then inspected the continuity/discontinuity patterns with regard to exercise characteristics. In order to explore differences in exercise frequency (days per week) before and during the lockdown, a Wilcoxon signed ranked test for paired samples (non-parametric) was calculated. The same test was used to explore changes in exercise intensity. A Kruskal-Wallis test (non-parametric) was employed for exploring differences in “exercise duration,” as this variable was measured as a difference variable in the survey (no separated pre–post measures available).

Possible differences in mood between participants from the continuity/discontinuity patterns were explored by ANOVA with “mood” as the dependent variable, and “exercise continuity/discontinuity pattern” as a factor. Univariate outliers were evaluated with boxplot methods. All detected outliers represent psychologically meaningful POMS scores, and deleting them did not change our main results. Therefore, we decided not to remove them from the analyzed data. Tukey post hoc tests were used for pairwise comparisons to further explore differences between continuity and discontinuity patterns, for significant ANOVAs. Additional ANCOVA's were calculated to check whether possible results are influenced by exercise frequency, session duration, or intensity.

Table 1 shows the distribution of participants in the four groups of exercise types (i.e., relations to the world) before and during the lockdown. Figure 1 illustrates the flows from and to the four types. Most of the participants were initially and remained in the I–Nature group during the lockdown (I–Nature continuity pattern: 297 participants). The second most typical pattern was a change from I–Me to I–Nature, that is a shift from indoor exercise (e.g., gym training) to exercising or doing sports in natural environments (I–Me/I–Nature discontinuity pattern: 128 participants). A smaller number of participants remained in I–Me (I–Me continuity pattern: 79 participants) or changed from I–Nature to I–Me (I–Nature/I–Me discontinuity pattern: 15 participants).

The majority of our study participants were exercising (before and after) in the I–Me and the I–Nature type of activities. Due to the comparatively small proportions of participants in other relations, we decided to focus our statistical explorations on those within the I–Me and I–Nature relations.

Means and standard deviations are given in Table 2. Differences and similarities in exercise intensity, frequency, and duration are illustrated in Figure 2.

We found a significant (small effect) of “type-shift” on “mood,” F(3, 515) = 3.01, p = 0.030, η² = 0.02. The post hoc tests indicated that this effect is caused by only one significant contrast. Those in the I–Me/I–Nature discontinuity pattern reported worse mood than those in the I–Nature continuity pattern (q = 0.17, p = 0.030). Calculated means and standard deviations are given in Table 2, and the data is illustrated in Figure 2D).

None of the ANCOVAs controlling for the potential covariate effects of exercise frequency, session duration, and intensity were significant. Detailed results of these tests are available upon request from the corresponding author.

The findings here should be interpreted with several limitations in mind. We were forced to utilize convenience sampling due to available resources and time limits for data collection. Consequently, our sample is not representative of the general population in that it mostly included well-educated participants who had a rather high-income status and who exercised or played sport 4–5 times per week. As Park and Kang (2008) noted, more educated individuals are more likely to exercise regularly. Smith et al. (2020) also reported that adults in the UK with lower income were less likely to be active during this pandemic-related lockdown. Although it was impossible to investigate this effect in our study, it is likely that for our participants their exercise and sport routines might be more important than for less active adults and be more strongly related to their mood. The season was changing during the data collection period, which could also have affected exercise and sport behavior. Furthermore, we were not able to collect mood data before the lockdown and therefore we do not have information on how participants' mood changed in response to the lockdown.

There can be several other factors that threaten mood during a lockdown. From this perspective, the small effect size of this finding is not very surprising, given that exercise behavior is only one aspect of daily life and one's identity. From the two discontinuity types analyzed, only one of them, the shift from I–Me to I–Nature, was significantly different from the I–Nature/I–Nature continuity pattern, suggesting that the type of discontinuity can matter, and this should be tested in larger, balanced samples. Any nonsignificant differences may be real, or due to lack of statistical power for these particular comparisons, which was not designed a priori. Furthermore, I–You and I–Society type of activities had an insufficient number of participants and were removed from the analysis. Therefore, these findings apply only to comparing changes between the categories we included in the final data and do not tell about other exercise type categories and the impact of (dis)continuities in them.

Finally, Breivik's (2020) fourfold framework is not a stable model but more like an exploration of ideal types of exercise/sport and their underlying “world relations.” Assigning certain activities such as jogging to either the I–Me or I–Nature category is certainly not clear cut. However, the main finding that changing your preferred type of exercise/sport is associated with different psychological outcomes compared to continuing a routine within the same type provides us with an indication that the type of exercise might matter in terms of our mood.