Impact of the COVID-19 virus outbreak on movement and play behaviors of Canadian children and youth: A national survey
The immediate collateral consequences of the COVID-19 outbreak include a decrease in the movement and play behaviors of Canadian children and youth
Canada, like many other countries, responded to the COVID-19 pandemic by requiring physical distancing and imposing restrictions on social gatherings and use of public playgrounds and parks. Such restrictions necessarily impact children’s and youth’s outdoor behaviors. This paper addresses this concern.
A national sample of Canadian parents completed an online survey focusing on changes in child and youth movement and play behaviors during the initial period of the COVID-19 outbreak. Responses from 1472 parents were analyzed by a team of researchers. Their aim was to assess the immediate changes in children’s and youth’s physical activity, play, sedentary behaviors, leisure screen time, and sleep. Their work was based on the premise that understanding these changes could be useful in guiding future efforts to preserve and promote child and youth health behaviors.
According to the parents’ reports, children and youth “were less active, played outside less, were more sedentary, engaged in more recreational screen-based activities, and slept more during the initial COVID-19 virus outbreak compared with before the restrictions”. There was a significant decline in all physical activities for children and youth, except household chores. “The most dramatic decline was with outdoor physical activity and sport.” Less than 5% of the children (age 5-11) and less than 1% of youth (age 14-17) were meeting movement guidelines during COVID-19 restrictions. Fewer girls in the 5–11 age range were meeting physical activity guidelines compared with boys the same age. Girls were also engaged in more social media use and slept more than boys. Children (age 5-11) were more active than youth (age 14-11). The greatest change in behavior as reported by the parents related to leisure screen-based activities. Children and youth were watching up to 6.5 hours per day. Several home-related factors were related to healthier movement activities: living in a house versus an apartment, being a younger parent, having a dog, parental encouragement, and – most significantly — parental participation in physical activity.
These results highlight unintended unhealthy behavior consequences of COVID-19 restrictions and call for a change in messaging about what to do during a pandemic. Health promotion messaging (“stay home”) needs to be balanced with disease prevention messaging (“go outside and play”).
Citation
Moore, S. A., Faulkner, G., Rhodes, R. E., Brussoni, M., Chulak-Bozzer, T., Ferguson, L. J., Mitra, S. A., O'Reilly, N., Spence, J. C., Vanderloo, L. M., Tremblay, M. S., (2020). Impact of the COVID-19 virus outbreak on movement and play behaviors of Canadian children and youth: A national survey. International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity, 17(85),
