Are certain people born to be athletic? Or is it something that's cultivated in them through experiences and the environment they grow up in? That's the question that researchers out of Britain recently asked, and the answer wasn't really surprising: Both play a role, but one aspect definitely has a larger impact on your exercise habits.

By studying both genetically identical as well as fraternal twins, recent studies have found that some people are inherently more drawn to sports than others, but that can change drastically depending on environmental factors. The researchers investigated the exercise habits of over 100 sets of twins, testing them for attributes such as how fidgety they were and how often they got physical activity, and they concluded that 73 percent of the differences in athleticism were down to environmental factors. They also found that exercise habits were nearly identical even in fraternal twins, who only share 50 percent of genes.


That's right, gone are the days when you can blame your couch potato behaviour on genetics -- It's mostly down to environmental factors. Whether you were born with a natural ability for physical activity or not is irrelevant -- your fitness behaviour is mostly influenced by the environment you grew up in. And while you can't turn back the clock and change how your parents raised you, you can create an exercise-friendly lifestyle now, for both yourself and your children. In fact, it's crucial that you do so.

"This research shows us how important it is to encourage exercise in schools and at home," Jane Waddell of Cancer Research UK said in a press release. "Some children may inherit versions of different genes that make them naturally more likely to enjoy sports and exercise. But their environment is the most powerful factor in determining how active they actually are."

It's so important to be physically active, so do your part by getting into a regular fitness routine. Not only could you be making your own household healthier, you could be influencing your friends to get fit too.