跳至主要内容

Convergent Validity of a Physical Activity Questionnaire against Objectively Measured Physical Activity in Adults

Traditionally, a self-reported questionnaire has been a cost-effective method of gathering information about physical activity (PA). Recently, however, the use of an objective measure, such as a pedometer, has been the focus of PA studies because it permits more accurate quantification. And it can be used to validate the findings of a PA questionnaire in a large population. The objective of this study was to determine the convergent validity of a PA questionnaire against objectively measured PA in adults obtained with the use of a pedometer. 

In the study, data from the Cardiovascular Risk in Young Finns Study (YFS) were collected from 1853 participants aged 30 - 45 years old. The participants completed a self-reported questionnaire that included items on leisure time, commuting and habitual PA. PA was expressed as leisure-time physical activity index (PAI) and metabolic equivalent hours/week (METh/wk). The participants wore a pedometer for seven consecutive days and used it to record their total daily and aerobic steps. And convergent validity analyses were performed by comparing means and standard deviations of daily total steps and aerobic steps and weekly minutes of aerobic steps and their intensity (steps per minute) in three categories of leisure-time PAI.

The results indicated that there was a low to moderate association between the self-reported questionnaire and pedometer measurements regarding both total steps and aerobic steps taken during leisure time and commuting PA. An association was not observed between pedometer data and habitual PA. Of the individual items in the questionnaire, questions that described the frequency of PA and the duration of vigorous PA correlated the most strongly with the pedometer values obtained for total and aerobic steps (r = 0.28 - 0.44, p ≤ 0.010).

In conclusion, these findings suggest that the YFS PA questionnaire is an acceptably valid subjective measure of lifestyle PA in Finnish adults and the practical advantages of its self-reporting will assure its continued use.

Article by Mirja Hirvensalo, et al, from Finland, Australia and the Netherlands.

Full access: http://mrw.so/PJsGq

Image by John, from Flickr-cc.

评论

发表评论

此博客中的热门博文

Does Immigration Promote the Investment of the Monopolistic Firm?

In the present paper, we examine the effect of increasing uncertainty of immigrants’ growth on the optimal timing of investment of a firm that has a monopolistic power over the labor market. It is revealed that when the uncertainty of immigrants’ growth is more than a threshold level, increasing uncertainty of immigrants’ growth accelerates the optimal timing of firms’ investment and enhances the economic growth, even if the uncertainty of immigrants’ growth is formulated by the geometric Brownian motion, which is in sharp contrast to the standard result that an increase in the uncertainty postpones the optimal timing. With an increase in the immigrants over the past ten years, workforces in the host countries have been growing significantly to the extent that the immigrants represent 70% of the increase in the workforce in Europe, and 47% in the United States as OECD indicates. In the present paper, we attempted to investigate the effect of increased uncertainty caused by the growi...
发表评论
阅读全文

Education Policy Implementation: A Mechanism for Enhancing Primary Education Development in Zanzibar

Education is one of the fundamental rights of individuals; therefore, the government of a country needs to develop and strengthen educational policy and quality as well as to ensure that everyone has equal access to basic education. The improvement of access and quality of education in the world is becoming as an essential factor in development, whereas the basic education (primary school), is acknowledged as a foundation of the higher educational development for every country. To fulfill this goal, governments introduce several policies and procedures; however, it requires some reforms and participation from the politician, policymakers, and other stakeholders to re-examine educational policy so that it can lead to multiplication and betterment of the reforms. Educational reforms actually focus on accountability. A positive educational development and reform is very challenging and needs more effort and strategy on how to use and utilize the resources effectively as such it can achie...
发表评论
阅读全文