O the places rural children will go…to get physical activity: a cross sectional analysis

Youth living in rural areas have higher risk for overweight/obesity. It is important to understand where these children engage in moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) and sedentary time to encourage or intervene on activity in specific locations. This study compared MVPA and sedentary time across locations among children with overweight/obesity in the rural Midwest of the U.S.

Participants wore an accelerometer and Global Positioning System tracker over 7-days to collect data on MVPA, sedentary time, and location. Locations were categorized as Home, Home Neighborhood, School, School Neighborhood, and 'Other'. Differences based on school and non-school days were examined.

Participants (n = 44; 8.8 ± 0.8 years; 61.4% females) engaged in an average of 41.4 min of MVPA/day and 6.7 h of sedentary time/day. In total, most MVPA was obtained at School (18.2 min/day, 44.2% of total MVPA), followed by Other (22.7%) and Home (20.5%). Participants accrued most of their sedentary time at School (141.7 min/day, 35.3%) followed by Home (31.2%) and Other locations (20.3%). Relative to time spent in location, participants were least active in their School Neighborhood (3.7% of time was in MVPA) and most active in Other locations (7.0%). When comparing non-school and school days, participants obtained 95.7 more minutes sedentary time at Home and were in Other locations for almost 2.5 more hours more on non-school days than school days. During school days, participants obtained 25.0 min/day of MVPA at school.

The School location is supportive of MVPA and high amounts of sedentary time. In addition to supporting children to travel to locations where they are likely to be active, efforts are needed to increase activity in locations where children spend substantial time. Providing more opportunities for activity in/around the home and reducing sedentary time during school may be promising targets for improving health among rural children.