Feasibility and Effectiveness of a Wearable Technology-Based Physical Activity Intervention in Preschoolers: A Pilot Study

Wonwoo Byun,Erica Lau,Timothy Brusseau

doi:10.3390/ijerph15091821

Abstract

The purpose of this pilot study was to evaluate the feasibility and the effectiveness of an intervention that employed a technology-based physical activity (PA) monitoring system and teacher-regulated strategies to promote PA in preschoolers. A total of 93 preschoolers (53% girls, 4.7 years) from 5 child care centers were recruited for a one-week intervention and randomly assigned into control (2 centers, n = 45) or intervention (3 centers, n = 48) group. Key intervention components included: (1) wearable device-based, real-time monitoring of children’s PA by classroom teachers and (2) teacher-regulated strategies for providing more opportunities for PA. Sedentary behavior (SED) and PA were measured using accelerometers. Overall, children in the intervention group showed significantly lower level of SED (31.6 vs. 33.6 min/h) and higher level of total PA (28.4 vs. 26.4 min/h) than children in the control group, after adjusting for age, sex, race, parent education level, parent perception of their child’s PA, BMI, and childcare centers. Teachers in the intervention group reported that the intervention was highly feasible to be implemented in their current classroom settings. In conclusion, we observed high acceptability and initial effectiveness of the current intervention. Subsequent research at larger-scale is warranted to fully evaluate the effectiveness of the intervention strategies tested in this study.

Highlights

Childhood obesity rates have more than doubled during the past few decades with approximately one in every five American children and youth currently obese [1]
Childcare centers were invited to participate in this study if (1) the center was licensed by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), (2) the curriculum complied with the NAEYC standards, (3) teachers had early child education degrees and (4) teachers had direct contacts to children in the classroom all the time
Our findings showed that this intervention has received a high acceptability from teachers and parents and demonstrated its initial effectiveness

Summary

Introduction

Childhood obesity rates have more than doubled during the past few decades with approximately one in every five American children and youth currently obese [1]. The current enrollment of 3- to 5-year-old children in preprimary programs (i.e., preschools or childcare centers) is approximately 12 million in the U.S and the majority are enrolled in full-day programs spending up to 10 hours per typical weekday in childcare centers [5]. Interventions aiming to increase preschoolers’ PA have reported inconsistent findings [9,10,11,12]

Methods

Discussion

Conclusion