Does free public transit increase physical activity and independent mobility in children? Study protocol for comparing children’s activity between two Finnish towns with and without free public transit

Pesola, Arto J.; Hakala, Pirjo; Berg, Päivi; Ramezani, Samira; Villanueva, Karen; Tuuva-Hongisto, Sari; Ronkainen, Jussi; Laatikainen, Tiina E.

doi:10.1186/s12889-020-8385-6

Cited by 8 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 47 publications

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“…Data was collected in FREERIDE project from 10 to 12-year-old children living in two South-Eastern Finnish cities, Mikkeli and Kouvola ( 25 , 26 ). After receiving permission to recruit participants through schools, children and their parents were contacted through 11 primary schools in Mikkeli and 10 primary schools in Kouvola.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Sensitivity and specificity of measuring children's free-living cycling with a thigh-worn Fibion® accelerometer

Pesola,

Esmaeilzadeh,

Hakala

et al. 2023

Front. Sports Act. Living

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ObjectiveCycling is an important part of children's active travel, but its measurement using accelerometry is a challenge. The aim of the present study was to evaluate physical activity duration and intensity, and sensitivity and specificity of free-living cycling measured with a thigh-worn accelerometer.MethodsParticipants were 160 children (44 boys) aged 11.5 ± 0.9 years who wore a triaxial Fibion® accelerometer on right thigh for 8 days, 24 h per day, and reported start time and duration of all cycling, walking and car trips to a travel log. Linear mixed effects models were used to predict and compare Fibion-measured activity and moderate-to-vigorous activity duration, cycling duration and metabolic equivalents (METs) between the travel types. Sensitivity and specificity of cycling bouts during cycling trips as compared to walking and car trips was also evaluated.ResultsChildren reported a total of 1,049 cycling trips (mean 7.08 ± 4.58 trips per child), 379 walking trips (3.08 ± 2.81) and 716 car trips (4.79 ± 3.96). There was no difference in activity and moderate-to-vigorous activity duration (p > .105), a lower cycling duration (−1.83 min, p < .001), and a higher MET-level (0.95, p < .001) during walking trips as compared to cycling trips. Both activity (−4.54 min, p < .001), moderate-to-vigorous activity (−3.60 min, p < .001), cycling duration (−1.74 min, p < .001) and MET-level (−0.99, p < .001) were lower during car trips as compared to cycling trips. Fibion showed the sensitivity of 72.2% and specificity of 81.9% for measuring cycling activity type during the reported cycling trips as compared to walking and car trips when the minimum required duration for cycling was less than 29 s.ConclusionsThe thigh-worn Fibion® accelerometer measured a greater duration of cycling, a lower MET-level, and a similar duration of total activity and moderate-to-vigorous activity during free-living cycling trips as compared to walking trips, suggesting it can be used to measure free-living cycling activity and moderate-to-vigorous activity duration in 10–12-year-old children.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Questionnaire included questions about background variables and visits to different destinations and travel modes, which are reported elsewhere ( 25 , 26 ).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sensitivity and specificity of measuring children's free-living cycling with a thigh-worn Fibion® accelerometer

Pesola,

Esmaeilzadeh,

Hakala

et al. 2023

Front. Sports Act. Living

Self Cite

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“…Studying human activity spaces can yield useful insights into many phenomena related to humans' living experience and facilitate our understanding of human behavior and its relationship with the built environment (Xu et al, 2016). For example, activity spaces have been used to study the associations between the built environment and mental health (Vallée et al, 2011), obesity (Zenk et al, 2011), travel mode choice (Pesola et al, 2020;Ramezani et al, 2019), residential dissonance (Hasanzadeh et al, 2019a(Hasanzadeh et al, , 2019bKajosaari et al, 2019a), and segregation (Wong & Shaw, 2011).…”

Section: Activity Space: Definition and Applicationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Exposure in these studies was estimated using information on home locations, everyday errand points, travel routes, travel modes, and travel frequency, all collected using an online map-based survey from a population of older adults in the Helsinki metropolitan area (Gottwald et al, 2016;Hasanzadeh et al, 2018). A similar approach was also proposed in a study protocol aimed at comparing children's activity and independent mobility between two Finnish towns with and without free public transit (Pesola et al, 2020). These studies used an online tool named Maptionnaire to develop map-based surveys (Kahila-Tani et al, 2019).…”

Section: Use Of Ppgis Data For Modeling Activity Spacesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Use of participatory mapping approaches for activity space studies: a brief overview of pros and cons

Hasanzadeh

2021

GeoJournal

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Participatory mapping approaches have raised increasing interest in a variety of fields of research and practice during the past two decades. However, their use in modeling and studying individual mobility and activity spaces is rather recent and limited. This paper focuses on the use of public participation GIS (PPGIS) data in activity space modeling and analysis and aims to draw more scholarly attention to the existing research potentials in this area. While reviewing the pros of using PPGIS for activity space studies, this paper also discusses the existing limitations and outlines how they can be addressed in future research. PPGIS effectively enables collecting data from larger samples, making it possible to conduct more comprehensive geospatial and statistical analyses on the data. Additionally, the strong link between individuals and places in PPGIS data facilitates more person-based approaches in investigating person-environment relationships. However, use of PPGIS for activity space studies comes with analytical and data quality challenges that need to be thoroughly taken into consideration. Particularly, future research needs to seek new ways of including the temporal dimension in PPGIS and find new methods of using the data for activity space modeling and analysis.

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“…The availability, cost, convenience, and quality of public transport may affect the use of private vehicles for school travel in a particular geographic setting [51,54]. Public transport is usually accompanied by walking and/or cycling between the origin, the transit stop, and the destination [55], so public transport use can contribute to daily moderate-to-vigorous physical activity [56,57]. Social norms, support from peers and parents, parental perceptions of different transport modes, built environment features of the home and school neighbourhoods, and perceptions of traffic and personal safety may influence parents' and young people's preferences for travel mode to school [30,58].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sociodemographic and Built Environment Associates of Travel to School by Car among New Zealand Adolescents: Meta-Analysis

Mandic

Ikeda

Garrett

et al. 2020

IJERPH

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Travelling to school by car diminishes opportunities for physical activity and contributes to traffic congestion and associated noise and air pollution. This meta-analysis examined sociodemographic characteristics and built environment associates of travelling to school by car compared to using active transport among New Zealand (NZ) adolescents. Four NZ studies (2163 adolescents) provided data on participants’ mode of travel to school, individual and school sociodemographic characteristics, distance to school and home-neighbourhood built-environment features. A one-step meta-analysis using individual participant data was performed in SAS. A final multivariable model was developed using stepwise logistic regression. Overall, 60.6% of participants travelled to school by car. When compared with active transport, travelling to school by car was positively associated with distance to school. Participants residing in neighbourhoods with high intersection density and attending medium deprivation schools were less likely to travel to school by car compared with their counterparts. Distance to school, school level deprivation and low home neighbourhood intersection density are associated with higher likelihood of car travel to school compared with active transport among NZ adolescents. Comprehensive interventions focusing on both social and built environment factors are needed to reduce car travel to school.

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Does free public transit increase physical activity and independent mobility in children? Study protocol for comparing children’s activity between two Finnish towns with and without free public transit

Abstract: Background: Children's habitual physical activity, including active travel and catching public transit (walking and cycling to and from destinations), and independent mobility (mobility without an adult) have decreased.

Cited by 8 publications

References 47 publications

Sensitivity and specificity of measuring children's free-living cycling with a thigh-worn Fibion® accelerometer

Sensitivity and specificity of measuring children's free-living cycling with a thigh-worn Fibion® accelerometer

Use of participatory mapping approaches for activity space studies: a brief overview of pros and cons

Sociodemographic and Built Environment Associates of Travel to School by Car among New Zealand Adolescents: Meta-Analysis

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