Parents' and adolescents' perceptions towards active commuting to school and school-based interventions to promote this behaviour

Abstract

Active commuting to school (ACS) is a routine behaviour that enables pupils to be more physical active in their day through walking or cycling to school. However, low rates of PA and levels of sedentary behaviours among youth population are increasing worldwide. So, it is necessary to analyse the factors that lead to this situation and contribute to increase physical activity domains. Therefore, the purposes of the present Doctoral Thesis were to analyse a commuting-to-school questionnaire for families, to study the parents' and adolescents' perceived barriers towards active commuting to school and to analyse the effects of a school-based intervention to promote this behaviour. These purposes were answered through 4 studies, whose methods are: Study I. A total of 611 child-parents pairs from Granada, completed in two sessions separated by 14 days, the “Family commuting-to-school behaviour” questionnaire (completed by family), and the “Mode and frequency of commuting to and from school” questionnaire (completed by children. The validation between family and children’s questions was assessed using the Kappa and Spearman correlation coefficients, and the test–retest reliability within the family questions was assessed using the Kappa and the weighted Kappa. Study II. A systematic literature review was conducted through seven online databases, from the beginning of the database to March 2018. Five categories of search terms were identified: parents, barriers, school, active commuting/transport and children. Specific terms used in the search were obtained from previous reviews and experts’ opinion. Also, the PRISMA guide was used to perform the review, and it was registered on PROSPERO. Study III. A total of 401 child–parent pairs, from Granada, Jaén, Toledo and Valencia, self-reported, their mode of commuting to school and work, respectively, and the children’s barriers to ACS. T-tests and chi square tests were used to analyse the differences by age for continuous and categorical variables, respectively. Binary logistic regressions were performed to study the association between ACS barriers of children and parents and ACS. Study IV. A total of 122 adolescents from Granada, Jaén and Valencia participated in this study (cycling group, n=60; and control group, n=62). The cycling group participated in a school-based intervention to promote cycling to school within the Physical Education lessons. To analyse the changes in the dependent variables at baseline and the follow-up of the intervention, Wilcoxon, Signs and McNemar tests were conducted. The association between intervention and commuting and barriers was observed by binary logistic regression. The main results extracted from the four studies were: Study I) The children’s modes of commuting to school (mean age: 11.44 ± 2.77 years old) were mainly passive (57.7% to school) while parents’ modes of commuting to work were mainly active (71.6%). The validity of the mode of commuting questionnaire was significant with high Kappa and Spearman coefficients. The test–retest reliability presented a good agreement for the mode of commuting to school in children, distance and time to school, and the mode of commuting to work in parents, while the questions on acceptable distance to walk or cycle to school showed a moderate to good agreement. Study II) The main parental barriers reported by parents of children (21 studies) were built environment, traffic safety, distance, crime-related safety and social support. The main parental barriers reported by parents of adolescents (6 studies) were built environment (street connectivity), distance, traffic safety and physical and motivation barriers. The parental barriers associated with ACS were mainly related to the built environment and traffic safety. Study III) Children and adolescents perceived higher physical and motivational barriers and social support barriers towards ACS than their parents (all p < 0.05). Additionally, the parents perceived higher distance, traffic safety, convenience, built environment, crime-related safety and weather as barriers towards ACS, than their children (all p < 0.05). Moreover, a higher perception of barriers was related to lower ACS. Study IV) The school-based intervention might be feasible at school context. The cycling knowledge improved after the school-based intervention; the scores of cycling skills were medium-low; the adolescents’ attendance, enjoyment and usefulness of the sessions were high. Concerning the effects, the rates of cycling to school and active commuting to/from school did not change after the school-based intervention, and only the “Built environment (walk)” barrier on the cycling group was higher on the follow-up. Also, no association was found between the participation on the school-based intervention with the rates of cycling or active commuting to school and the perception of barriers to ACS. The main conclusions from the four studies were: Study I) The “Family Commuting-to-School Behaviour” questionnaire could be a useful tool to assess the mode of commuting of children, distance and time to school for researchers and practitioners. Study II) The results showed that it is crucial to involve parents through interventions to reduce the perception of safety and to increase awareness of the importance of ACS. In addition, these strategies should be complemented by environmental changes performed by local governments. Study III) The outcomes of the study showed the necessity of attenuating the perceptions of children and their parents in order to increase ACS. This is relevant to develop interventions in the specific contexts of each barrier and involving both populations. Study IV) The results manifest the necessity of developing and implementing school-based cycling interventions, and they may include families and other agents such as policy makers to create multicomponent interventions.