Exploring parent-reported barriers to supporting their child’s health behaviors: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

BackgroundParents can influence the health behaviors of their children by engaging in supportive behaviors (e.g., playing outside with their child, limiting recreational screen time). How, and the extent to which parents engage in supportive behaviors may be influenced by perceived barriers. The purpose of this study is to explore whether the frequency, and types, of barriers to providing parental support are dependent on the type of child health behavior being supported (i.e., physical activity, recreational screen time reduction, healthy eating, and sleep).MethodsStudy participants were 1140 Ontario parents with at least one child under the age of 18 who completed a Computer Assisted Telephone Interview (CATI) survey about parental support behaviors. Open-ended responses about perceived barriers to parental support were coded, and aggregated to meta-categories adopted from the social-ecological model (i.e., individual child, individual parent, interpersonal, environmental). Freidman rank sum tests were used to assess differences across child behaviors. Wilcoxon rank sum tests with Bonferroni adjustments were used as a post hoc test for significant Freidman results.ResultsThere were more barriers reported for supporting physical activity than for any other child behavior (ps < .01, As ≥ .53). Parents reported more parent level and environmental level barriers to supporting child physical activity versus other behaviors (ps < .001, As ≥ .55), child level barriers were more frequently reported for supporting healthy eating and sleep (ps < .001, As ≥ .57), and interpersonal barriers were more frequently reported for supporting recreational screen time reduction (ps < .001, As ≥ .52). Overall, parents reported more child and parent level barriers versus interpersonal and environmental barriers to supporting child health.ConclusionsParents experience a variety of barriers to supporting their children’s health behaviors. Differences in types of barriers across child health behaviors emerged; however, some frequently reported barriers (e.g., child preferences) were common across behaviors. Interventions promoting parental support should consider strategies that can accommodate parents’ busy schedules, and relate to activities that children find enjoyable. Creating supportive environments that help facilitate support behaviors, while minimizing parent level barriers, may be of particular benefit. Future research should explore the impact of barriers on parental support behaviors, and effective strategies for overcoming common barriers.

Associations of Physical Activity and Sedentary Time in Primary School Children with Their Parental Behaviors and Supports

“…Previous studies also reported that parenting style was associated with children’s PA [ 14 , 15 , 16 ]. For example, in a computer-assisted telephone interview survey in Ontario, parents reported more parent level and environmental level barriers to support child PA compared to other behaviors such as reducing recreational screen time, encouraging healthy eating, and ensuring good sleep habits [ 36 ]. We therefore propose that more studies on parenting style are needed to identify the relationship between parenting style and PA in children.…”

Parents’ Perceived Barriers to Accessing Sports and Recreation Facilities in Ontario, Canada: Exploring the Relationships between Income, Neighbourhood Deprivation, and Community

“…Cohen’s kappa was calculated to establish inter-rater reliability, and exceeded the acceptable agreement ( k = 0.71), so a single coder completed the remainder of the coding. This approach to coding has previously been used to code barriers to supporting child health behaviours, collected in a similar manner [ 70 ]. Given the granularity with which the barriers were coded through this process, individual barriers were aggregated up to one of four barrier types for analysis, informed by the socio-ecological perspective: child-level, parent-level, facility-related, and environmental ( Table 2 ).…”

Perceived barriers to healthy lifestyle from the parental perspective of overweight and obese students

“…There is no any study in Iranian population in this field. In literature review, we found few studies about parental perceived barriers to healthy diet and PA.[ 29 30 ]…”