Assessment of physical activity: a critical appraisal

Abstract

Assessment of physical activity in a free-living environment is important for understanding relations between physical activity and health and determining the effectiveness of interventions. Techniques include behavioral observation, questionnaires in the form of diaries, recall questionnaires and interviews, and physiological markers like heart rate, calorimetry, and motion sensors. The doubly labeled water method has become the gold standard for the validation of field methods of assessing physical activity. Then, questionnaires show a low reliability and validity but can be adequately applied as an activity-ranking instrument. The heart rate requires individual calibration to be an effective method to assess physical activity only at group level. The indicated method for the assessment of habitual physical activity in daily life is a doubly labeled water validated accelerometer. Future developments are simultaneous measurement of body acceleration and heart rate for the assessment of physical fitness. A new generation of accelerometers will provide information on body posture and activity recognition to allow objective assessment of subjects' habitual activities, options for a healthy change, and effects of the follow-up of any changes.

Effects of snack consumption for 8 weeks on energy intake and body weight

“…Snack consumption and body weight M Viskaal -van Dongen et al needed to confirm this, using, for example, doubly labeled water, 24 this observation suggests that subjects mainly compensated by adapting their energy intake. This is supported by previous studies showing that total energy expenditure is not affected by meal frequency, which suggests that any effects of snack consumption on body weight are mediated through energy intake and not energy expenditure.…”

Obesity Discrimination in the Workplace: “You’re Hired!”

“…Therefore, the short EPIC questionnaire was considered to be an adequate activityranking instrument (Westerterp, 2009 * The order of the category pairings (blocks 3, 4, 6, and 7) will be counterbalanced. Rudolph and colleagues found a strong effect size of d − 0.70 suggesting strong weight bias on hiring outcomes (for further interpretation, see Rudolph et al, 2009).…”

“I'm not physically active ‐ I only go for walks”: Physical activity in patients with longstanding eating disorders

“…7 Another method is objective monitoring through, for example, accelerometers. 8,9 Females from the general population tend to overreport amount of physical activity when comparing to objective assessment. 10 To our knowledge, no previous study has compared self-reported and objectively assessed physical activity in patients with ED.…”