Parental Support for Physical Activity and Sedentary Behavior among Chinese Schoolchildren

Abstract

Physical activity is essential for the development of children and adolescents. Among different social and environmental factors, parental support plays important role on influencing young people’s physical activity. However, the associations between different kinds of parental support and physical activity among Chinese children and adolescents have not been explored thoroughly with a large size of samples. PURPOSE: To explore the roles of different kinds of parental support (encouragement, accompany, financial support and model) on influencing moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) and sedentary behavior (SED) among Chinese school-aged children. METHODS: The data used in analyses derived from the Physical Activity and Health of Children and Adolescents Survey 2015 in Shanghai, China. 78516 students (grade 1-12) from all 17 districts of Shanghai, representing 5% of the population of schoolchildren, were randomly selected to participate in the self-report questionnaire survey. Finally, the present study contains 61429 participants (girl 49.3%, mean age 11.77 years). Descriptive statistics and logistical regression were used to examine the associations between MVPA, SED and various kinds of parental support by gender. RESULTS: Compared to the low parental support groups, young people in high encouragement, accompany, financial support, and model (the highest among four factors) (boy: OR=1.60, 95% CI: 1.52-1.69; girl: OR=1.63, 95% CI: 1.54-1.73) groups are more likely to being at least 1h MVPA daily. On the contrary, compared to the high parental support groups, young people in low accompany and model groups are more likely to being at least 2h SED daily during both weekdays and weekend. CONCLUSIONS: Various kinds of parental support have influence in schoolchildren for them to be physically active regardless the gender. Parents as the model and parental accompany have the biggest influence for youth being active. This study suggests that efforts should be focused on parents and their behavior when design and implement interventions aiming to promote young people’s physical activity. Supported by Shanghai Shuguang Program (14SG46), Shanghai Pujiang Program (16PJC075), and Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality (16080503400).