Abstract
The purpose of this study was to describe children’s daily compliance with moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) recommendations across a week in different parts of the world, and to identify individual- and school-level correlates that may explain differences in daily MVPA compliance. The sample included 6553 children aged 9–11 years from 12 countries, and multilevel statistical analyses were used, including both child- and school-level variables. Most children did not comply with the MVPA guidelines on a daily basis: Chinese children complied the least, whereas Finnish, Australian, Colombian, UK, and Kenyan children complied the most. Boys (rate ratio [RR] = 1.47) and children with higher unhealthy diet scores (RR = 1.08) complied more, but overweight/obese children (RR = 0.81), earlier maturing children (RR = 0.93), and those who spent more time in screen activities (RR = 0.98) and sleeping (RR = 0.96) had the lowest compliance. At the school level, children with access to playground or sport equipment (RR = 0.88, for both) tended to comply less, whereas those with access to a gymnasium outside the school hours complied more with the MVPA guidelines (RR = 1.14). Significant between-country differences in children’s daily MVPA compliance were observed, reflecting not only site characteristics, but also the importance of individual traits and local school contexts.
Highlights
The purpose of this study was to describe children’s daily compliance with moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) recommendations across a week in different parts of the world, and to identify individual- and school-level correlates that may explain differences in daily MVPA compliance
In general, children were about 2 years from their estimated peak height velocity (PHV); children from United Kingdom (UK) and Australian sites were closest to their PHV, while those from the Kenyan site were the furthest (−2.5 years to PHV)
Averaged across the week and participants, in seven of the country sites children exceeded the ≥60 min/day MVPA guideline; the lowest average daily MPVA was observed in children from the Chinese site, while those from Kenya and Finland sites showed the highest daily average
Summary
The purpose of this study was to describe children’s daily compliance with moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) recommendations across a week in different parts of the world, and to identify individual- and school-level correlates that may explain differences in daily MVPA compliance. The prevalence of youth, aged 5–17 years, meeting MVPA guidelines on a daily basis ranged from 1.9% in girls to 9% in boys when using every monitored and valid day[5] These data came from different sources where accelerometer monitoring ranged from 2 to 7 days; further, the exact number of days children complied with the guidelines was not explicitly reported. These worldwide differences in children’s physical activity levels can be traced to heterogeneity in their biological, behavioural and environmental characteristics. The present study aims (1) to investigate children’s daily compliance with daily MVPA recommendations across a week in 12 different study sites with diverse human development/sociodemographic characteristics from all major world regions; and (2) to identify individual-level and school-level correlates across countries that may explain differences in daily MVPA compliance
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