Children's attitudes towards activity and perceptions of physical education

The attitudes towards activity (CATPA) and perceptions of physical education of a sample of 291 secondary and 316 primary boys and girls were investigated with respect to health promotion. Using analysis of variance techniques significant differences between boys' and girls' attitudes were found in both the secondary and primary samples. Girls had significantly more positive attitudes towards physical activity than boys, but the data yielded no differences in attitudes between the socio-economic levels. The influence of CATPA scores of the literacy sets variable was significant, but the numeracy sets variable yielded non-significant results. This result highlighted the implications of internal school organization for health promotion and children's affective development. MANOVA was used to analyse gender differences in CATPA subdomain scores. Girls from both samples were found to have significantly more positive attitudes than boys in the aesthetic domain. Differences were also found in social growth and vertigo scores. All groups ranked health and fitness objectives highly, with a similar pattern of pupil perceptions of physical education emerging from both samples.