Comparing estimates of physical activity in children across different cut‐points and the associations with weight status

Abstract

This study aimed to compare sedentary time (SED) and intensity-specific physical activity (PA) estimates and the associations of SED and PA with body mass index (BMI) and waist circumference (WC) using three different sets of cut-points in preschool-aged children. A total of 751 children (4.7 ± 0.9 years, boys 52.7%) wore an ActiGraph GT3X+BT accelerometer on their hip for 7 days (24 h). Euclidean norm −1 G with negative values rounded to zero (ENMO) and activity counts from vertical axis (VACounts) and vector magnitude (VMCounts) were derived. Estimates of SED and light, moderate, vigorous, and moderate-to-vigorous PA (MVPA) were calculated for commonly used cut-points by Hildebrand et al., Butte et al., and Evenson et al. Furthermore, the prevalence of meeting the PA recommendation, 180 min/day of which at least 60 min/day being MVPA, were assessed for the cut-points. Multilevel mixed analysis was used to examine associations of SED and PA with BMI and WC. In accordance with the results, SED and PA intensity estimates differed largely across cut-points (i.e., SED = 22-341 min/day; light PA = 52-257 min/day; moderate PA = 5-18 min/day; vigorous PA = 7-17 min/day; MVPA = 13-35 min/day), and the prevalence of children meeting the PA recommendation varied from 4% to 70%. Associations of SED and PA with BMI or WC varied between the cut-points. Our results indicate that SED and PA estimates in preschool-aged children between studies using these This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License, which permits use and distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, the use is non-commercial and no modifications or adaptations are made.

Adherence to the World Health Organization’s physical activity recommendation in preschool-aged children: a systematic review and meta-analysis of accelerometer studies

“…A detailed description of study characteristics can be seen in Supplementary Material 2 . Overall, seven studies were conducted exclusively in the United States [ 37 – 44 ], five in Canada [ 34 , 45 – 48 ], five in Australia [ 49 – 53 ], four in China [ 54 – 57 ], three in Belgium [ 58 – 60 ], three in South Africa [ 61 – 63 ], three in Brazil [ 64 – 66 ], two in the United Kingdom [ 67 , 68 ], two in Sweden [ 69 , 70 ], two in Japan [ 71 , 72 ], two in Poland [ 73 , 74 ], and a single study each from Switzerland [ 75 ], Bangladesh [ 76 ], Denmark [ 77 ], Finland [ 19 ], Norway [ 78 ], Portugal [ 79 – 82 ], Singapore [ 83 ], and Vietnam [ 84 ]. Additionally, there was one international study that included children from multiple European countries [ 85 ], and one intercontinental study which included children from Europe and United States [ 86 ].…”

“…Among studies not included in the meta-analysis, one reported that 80-90% of children achieve the overall physical activity recommendation [ 72 ], two reported that between 70 and 80% achieve the recommendation [ 19 , 67 ], one reported that between 60 and 70% of children achieved the recommendation [ 46 ], one reported that between 50 and 60% achieved the recommendation, [ 47 ], one reported that between 10 and 20% of children achieved the recommendation [ 45 ], and one reported that between 0 and 10% of children achieved the recommendation [ 19 ].…”

“…In total, 27 studies reported on the difference in adherence to at least one component or the overall physical activity recommendation between boys and girls [ 19 , 34 , 37 , 39 , 40 , 48 – 50 , 53 , 57 , 60 , 62 , 65 – 70 , 72 , 74 – 78 , 82 , 83 , 86 ]. The prevalence ratio comparing the prevalence of girls adhering to recommendation compared to boys are displayed in Table 2 .…”

“…However, a range of accelerometers from different manufacturers (e.g., ActiGraph, Actical, ActivPAL), and various models of accelerometers from within manufacturers exists. Further complicating things, a range of validated cut-points exist for each accelerometer model, for various age groups, meaning that comparing estimates across studies may not be possible [ 18 , 19 ]. Yet, multiple best practice guidelines for accelerometer data processing exist [ 20 , 21 ], and clear consistencies between some studies are apparent [ 22 ], making pooling estimates between some studies plausible.…”

Association of daily and time-segmented physical activity and sedentary behaviour with mental health of school children and adolescents from rural Northeastern Ontario, Canada

“…We believe this to be a positive finding, considering the many health benefits that result from maintaining high levels of PA ( Poitras et al, 2016 ; Chaput et al, 2020 ). However, we also recognize that high levels of PA in research with children and adolescents are often attributable to methodological decisions ( Kim et al, 2017 ; Llorente-Cantarero et al, 2021 ; Leppänen et al, 2022 ). We have used standardized protocols and recommended acceleration cut-off points for the age-group of our sample ( Migueles et al, 2017 , 2019 ), and thereby, our results are comparable to several studies that used the same methods.…”