Saudi Women Empowerment Constraints for Participation in Sports and Physical Activities

Abstract

Saudi women have recently witnessed unprecedented sociocultural changes in lifestyle and prosperity, as a result of recent female empowerment policies. Among these changes is the public acceptance of female participation in sport and physical activities. However, due to lack of good opportunities for sport and physical activity participation in previous years, Saudi women might still encounter tremendous factors that prevent or limit their participation. The study purpose was to investigate constraints that limit or prohibit Saudi female from participation in light of the recent empowerment policies. The developed questionnaire was based on the leisure constraint theory and distributed in all regions of the country, yielding a sample of 866 female participants. The results indicated that the majority used their homes as the place for participation, with significant differences among geographical location in intrapersonal and interpersonal constraints, and an overall high score in structural constraints. It was concluded that Saudi females’ ability to participate in sports and physical activities is severely constrained by too many factors that need to be alleviated by policy makers and investors.