Engaging youth in systems thinking for active recreation

Youth active recreation is influenced by complex interactions among factors in the active recreation system. Systems approaches can help identify ways to intervene; however, young people are rarely involved in this process. This study piloted the use of Collective Intelligence (CI), a participatory systems approach, to engage young people in identifying barriers to active recreation and co-creating solutions. Three CI workshops were conducted in Victoria, Australia, involving nine participants aged 12–17. In each workshop, participants generated and prioritized barriers, co-created systems maps, and collaboratively designed solutions aligned to the mapped systems. Field notes captured reflections on facilitation and youth engagement. Across workshops, 48 barriers were identified and grouped into eight categories: Shyness and social skills, Lack of support, Financial, Time, Space and equipment, Public Transport, Safety, and Medical. Participants then co-created solutions across individual (n = 5), community (n = 11), and government (n = 5) levels. Individual-level strategies focused on enhancing social skills; community-level ideas focused on public transport and inclusive spaces; Government actions included subsidies for extracurricular activities. Reflections highlight the value of CI to engage young people in articulating interconnected influences in their lived experience with active recreation. Key strengths of the process included making complexity visible and actionable. Challenges included uncertainty of upstream issues, uneven participant engagement, conflation of terms, and maintaining focus. This study offers actionable strategies to potentially overcome these challenges for anyone who wants to engage young people in systems thinking. The inclusion of a youth researcher was valuable in supporting young people to contribute their ideas.