Bedfordshire academic contributes to new study on women’s safety while exercising

Dr Joanne Hill, Senior Lecturer in Physical Education & Sport Sociology, co-authored the research alongside Dr Laura Gubby, Senior Lecturer in the Sociology of Physical Education, Physical Activity & Sport at Canterbury Christ Church University, which looked specifically at women who prefer to run off road or trail run by themselves.

The report found that women had many influences when it came to deciding whether to exercise outdoors, but despite 'risky moments' and regularly feeling vulnerable, the runners refused to stop due to the enjoyment the activity brought them.

The report highlights some of the areas that can affect women's decisions before and even during outdoor running. These influences include 'suspicious' male trail users, whether the risk outweighs the enjoyment and the opinion of their families and friends as to whether they should be running those paths alone.

Despite most of the interviewees not having had direct experiences of harassment whilst running trails, they still felt vulnerable to attack as a solo female runner. They would be constantly assessing their place in the environment, trying to establish the legitimacy of different people using the trails.

For example, dog-walkers were perceived to pose no safety concerns for the runners and were generally accepted as legitimate users of the space. Identified as particularly suspicious was a man without a dog, who consistently came up as most likely to provoke anxiety and fear in solo women runners.

Dr Hill - who is also the Public Engagement and Innovation Lead of the Institute of Sport and Physical Activity Research (ISPAR) - said: "Our research aimed to understand the experiences of and influences on women who choose to run in rural areas, that can thought of as risky. Rural spaces and trail running are associated with resilience and mental health benefits among women runners, linked to the physical difficulty of trail running as well as being able to leave everyday stresses behind.

"Women deserve to have safe spaces to run or undertake any form of physical activity in public spaces, whether rural, suburban or urban, in nature and in built-up areas."

Following on from this study, Dr Hill and the research team will next be exploring international cultural and political differences on the topic of running, working with women in 13 countries around the world to discuss their experiences of risk, safety and harassment.