Abstract
BackgroundMost sedentary behavior measures focus on occupational or leisure-time sitting. Our aim was to develop a comprehensive measure of adult sedentary behavior and establish its measurement properties.MethodThe SIT-Q was developed through expert review (n = 7), cognitive interviewing (n = 11) and pilot testing (n = 34). A convenience sample of 82 adults from Calgary, Alberta, Canada, participated in the measurement property study. Test-retest reliability was assessed by intraclass correlation coefficients (ICCs) comparing two administrations of the SIT-Q conducted one month apart. Convergent validity was established using Spearman’s rho, by comparing the SIT-Q estimates of sedentary behaviour with values derived from a 7-Day Activity Diary.ResultsThe SIT-Q exhibited good face validity and acceptability during pilot testing. Within the measurement property study, the ICCs for test-retest reliability ranged from 0.31 for leisure-time computer use to 0.86 for occupational sitting. Total daily sitting demonstrated substantial correlation (ICC = 0.65, 95% CI: 0.49, 0.78). In terms of convergent validity, correlations varied from 0.19 for sitting during meals to 0.76 for occupational sitting. For total daily sitting, estimates derived from the SIT-Q and 7 Day Activity Diaries were moderately correlated (ρ = 0.53, p < 0.01).ConclusionThe SIT-Q has acceptable measurement properties for use in epidemiologic studies.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/1471-2458-14-899) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Highlights
Most sedentary behavior measures focus on occupational or leisure-time sitting
In relation to the order of the SIT-Q items, the expert reviewers all agreed that a logical flow is important for minimizing double-counting of time, and they concurred that the order of the SIT-Q items was sensible
One expert made the recommendation that a table of contents be included inside the front cover of the questionnaire: providing participants with an understanding of where and when they can report time spent in various seated tasks might help to prevent some double-counting of time
Summary
Most sedentary behavior measures focus on occupational or leisure-time sitting. Few questionnaires attempt to assess adult sedentary behavior across multiple domains [23]. Such measures are necessary in order to determine whether the behavioral context is important in the associations between sedentary behavior and chronic disease [11,24]. To address this need we developed the SIT-Q, a measure of habitual sedentary behaviors across occupation, transportation, household and leisure-time domains. Our aim was to develop a feasible and cost-effective measure of usual sedentary behavior for use in population cohort studies
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