Active Commuting and Physical Fitness: A Systematic Review.

Duarte Henriques-Neto,Pedro António Sánchez-Miguel,Susana Garradas,Andreia Pelegrini,Miguel Peralta,Adilson Marques,André Araújo Pinto

doi:10.3390/ijerph17082721

Abstract

Physical fitness (PF) is considered an excellent biomarker of health. One possible strategy to improve PF levels is active commuting. This review, performed accordingly to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews guidelines includes scientific articles published in peer-reviewed journals up to December 2019 that aim at examining the relationship between active travel/commuting and PF. The search was performed in three databases (PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science). Sixteen studies were included in this review. Findings from the 16 studies were unclear. From the eleven studies on children and adolescents screened, eight were cross-sectional, one prospective cohort, one quasi-experimental, and one experimental. From the five studies on adults, four were experimental and one cross-sectional. Body mass, waist circumference, skinfolds, fat mass, cardiorespiratory fitness, upper and lower strength tests were performed in children, adolescents, and adults. Agility and speed tests were performed only in the young age groups. Majority of the investigations on young ages and adults have shown positive effects or relationships between active commuting and several attributes of PF. However, to avoid misconceptions, there is a need for future robust investigation to identify potential mediators or confounders in this relationship. More robust investigations are essential to understand how and whether decision-makers and public health authorities can use active travel/commuting as a strategy to improve PF in all ages.

Highlights

Physical inactivity is one of the main risk factors for mortality worldwide [1,2]
27 articles were extracted for full text read, from which 11 were excluded for not meeting the inclusion criteria, namely: three were not focused in active travel/commuting, two were systematic reviews, four were cited in previous systematic reviews, and two were written in Korean or Japanese
Findings from this review suggest that among younger ages, active travel/commuting is inconsistently related to Physical fitness (PF) and that several factors should be considered to compare the effectiveness of active commuting in improving PF outcomes in children and adolescents

Summary

Introduction

Physical inactivity is one of the main risk factors for mortality worldwide [1,2]. There is a global need to promote strategies to increase physical activity (PA) levels. PA can be performed in several contexts such as work, organized sports, recreational activities, home activities, and active travel/commuting [2,3,4,5]. Active travel/commuting is an ecological and non-motorized transport mode for all ages, which can be characterized by a form of displacement through PA from/to home and workplace/school. Active commuting increases individual energy expenditure and is easy to incorporate in normal daily routines [6,7]. Active travel/commuting, such as cycling or walking, seems to be an effective strategy to improve daily PA levels; it might improve physical fitness

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