Physical Activity Opportunities For Collaboration

Research Methods

Discuss about the Physical Activity Opportunities for Collaboration.

The review of previous studies suggests that for children, it is required that they need to do regular physical activity which is beneficial for the social, physical and mental health of children and adolescents. Besides this, nowadays, children and adolescents prefer passive transport in place of active transport which is in the form of walking and cycling. This resulted in declining in the physical activity in children and adolescents (Carson, et al. 2010).

Nowadays, children do not indulge in any physical activity as they do not prefer to reach school by cycling or walking which results in reduced and variable physical activity among children.  Nowadays, there is a large distance exists between school and home which has also resulted in the change in the preference of using active transport to passive transport. The children who uses cycling or walking to the school has gained more physical activity if they live farther from the school. It is also reviewed from the past studies that distance from school also affects the sedentary behavior in children. The main aim of the research is top predict the physical activity related to active transport in children and adolescents by the use of distance between home and school by the way of regression model. Besides this, the other purpose of the article is to evaluate the nature of the relationship between commuting distance and active transport.   

For the purpose of carrying out the research, a sample of 8 primary, 3 secondary and 2 intermediate schools were selected from Auckland. In addition to this, for commuting purpose a public bus service is provided in Auckland where the schools are located (Sallis, et al. 2004).

Along with this, intermediate and secondary schools provide school buses to commute for children. Besides this, 2000 children were selected from the schools aged 1 to 11 years by the use of stratified random sampling technique. The consent of children has been taken in written for the purpose of participating in the research study carried out related to the research topic. In addition to this, the host institutions have provided ethical approval by the ethics committee. For the purpose of measurement of the physical activity, pedometers are used. In this research study, YAMAX CW 700 is used which uses same internal mechanisms as YAMAX SW 200. YAMAX SW 200 is considered as the reliable and accurate pedometer available for measuring the physical activity carried out by children and adolescents (Corti & Donovan, 2002).

Results and Findings

Pedometers are checked before its use for the purpose of finding defects by the use of 100 step walking test which is repeated 5 times. An error in the pedometers did not exceed 2%. The researcher has asked the participants to wear pedometer for 7 consecutive days except while sleeping and swimming.  The physical activity is measured for only 5 days out of 7 days as pedometers were not available to the participants on the first day and the last day. In addition to this, review of the previous research studies provides that the data of 4-5 days is sufficient to obtain a reliable measure of the physical activity. Besides this, researcher has excluded data of a day in which pedometer is removed for longer than 1 hour. In addition to this, the participants were considered outliners if the daily step count is lower than 1000 or greater than 30000 and removed from subsequent analysis. In addition to this, if the data of 1 weekend and weekday is lost then the participants were excluded from the study. In addition to this, the method used to collect the data and information is observation and survey through questionnaire method (Duncan, Duncan & Scholfield, 2008).

These methods facilitates in gathering large amount of information pertaining to the research work in less time. In this research study, information related to home addresses and usual transport mode used by the children to and from school is gathered by the use of survey through questionnaire method. The questionnaires were filled by the parents for the children aged 1 to 11 years. The participants whio have used multiple transport mode were assigned to a single mode based on the priority criteria. The information related to the distance between the school and home is gathered by the use of Network Analyst Extension in ArcGIS 10.1 and the database of Land Information New Zealand. In addition to this, for the analysis of the information gathered by the use of observation and survey through questionnaire method, researcher has used different methods to get valid and reliable results such as descriptive statistics, chi- square tests, Mann Whitney U tests (Cooper, et al. 2003).

The researcher has also stratified the distance between home and school into 9 discrete groups. In this research study, the author has used exploratory research design which facilitates in gaining insights into different aspects of the research topic. This is a quantitative research as it facilitates in providing information in numerical terms to the users of the information to make appropriate decisions. The researcher has adopted has adopted suitable research design for the purpose of gaining valid and reliable results (Rissel, et al. 2012). The exploratory design is appropriate to analyze the aim and objectives of the research study. It facilitates in exploring the information related to the research topic. There is a use of primary data collection methods which helps in provision of the information related to the current scenario of the problem which in turn facilitates in taking appropriate decisions related to the research problem. The exploratory research design does not facilitate in providing conclusions to the research topic. It facilitates in carrying out the descriptive research which provides the outcomes of the research topic in a conclusive manner (Badland & Schofield, 2005).

Discussion

The researcher has used appropriate data collection methods as it facilitates in gathering the specific information needed to carry out the research in a proper manner. In addition to this, stratified sampling technique facilitates in reducing sample selection bias and helps in minimizing the over and under representation of some of the segments of the population. In the stratified random sampling technique, a sample population is divided into different segments and then the sample is selected on the random basis. This helps in selection of the appropriate sample required for the study. Out of the selected sample, valid and reliable information is collected from 595 participants which include children ranging from 5 years to 16 years. The main reason behind obtaining of the information from these children is that there is no interference of parents in providing accurate information to the researcher. The results of the study indicate that the boys have relatively more number of steps during weekdays and weekends in comparison to girls (Grow, et al.2008).

It also indicates that there are no other significant difference between girls and boys. Besides this, the results also indicates that the children who uses active transport such as cycling and walking has more number of steps during weekdays in comparison to weekend days. This is because on weekdays they go to school by the use of active transportation modes. Besides this, it is also found that the children who uses active transport has accumulated more number of steps in comparison to those who uses passive transport to go to school. The results of the study also indicates that there is an increased use of the passive transport by children as there is an increased distance between their homes and schools (Pate, et al. 2006).

In addition to this, it is also observed that there is an increase in the use of active transport by the children of secondary school in comparison to children of primary school. Children that have their schools 1 to 2 km from their home uses active transport for commuting to and from schools. Other factors such as age and sex has no significant impact on the distances between school and home. It is found that as the distance increases the use of active transport decreases. Besides this, the daily physical activity increases in those children who uses active transport. There is a high probability of the use of active transport in a case when there is an existence of short distances between the school and home. The researcher has used appropriate methods for the purpose of analyzing the results of the research study (Carver, et al. 2011).

Limitations

The researcher states that there is a prevalence of mental health problems in many children globally. There is about 22% of children in preschool and school aged children who suffer from mental health problems. In addition to this, only some children seek professional help for the cure of the mental health problems. The main aim of the research study is to investigate parent’s help seeking processes for young children that have mental health problems. Besides this, it also focuses on the evaluation of the factors that hinder the access of the appropriate treatment for children that suffers from mental health problems (Zwaanswijk, et al.2003).

The researcher has done appropriate search and review of the previous studies in order to carry out the research in an appropriate manner. In addition to this, different populations rely on different factors such as attitudes and beliefs related to help seeking for the purpose of informing the decision to access support. The previous studies suggest that parents find obstacles to access professional help for their child due to presence of negative beliefs and attitudes. Parents also seek professional help in three stages which include recognition of the problem, requirement of professional help for the problem and overcoming the physical and attitudinal barriers to help seeking ((Hunt & Eisenberg, 2010).

This research study has focus on the Australian based sample of young children for the purpose of analyzing the behavior of parents to seek professional help for their children There is a selection of 442 children that are aged 6 years from the total of 733 infants from Australia by the use of longitudinal study methods. The selection is made from the infants in maternal and child health associations. Besides this, it also provide invitation to primary care givers to collect the information related to the research topic. Besides this, the researcher has obtained a consent from the parents for the purpose of collection of the information by the way of survey through questionnaire method. The use of survey through questionnaire method helps in collection of the information from wide population in a quick manner. It is less time consuming process. Child Behavior Checklist is an instrument used for the purpose of measuring the problems related to mental health in the children. The score on this instrument is above the standard or borderline then it is regarded the child is suffering from the problems related to mental health (Cauce, et al.2002).

Conclusion

When asked by parents regarding consulting any professional help till the age of five, and the type of services availed. The responses are classified into four categories namely mental health services, general health services, informed help and no help sought. In addition to this, the recognition of the difficult child behavior by parents is measured by the use of Australian Temperament Project’s global rating scale. The rating of more difficult than average signifies that there is a presence of mental health problems at the stage of infants. The mental health problems were described in terms of behavior problems to parents such as aggression, anxiety, compliance, and emotional distress. The researcher has also provided information related to the professionals to whom parents can seek help for their children those has mental problems included pediatricians, psychiatrists and child psychologists (Rickwood, et al.2005).

In addition to this, pilot study is conducted for the purpose of finding the factors that affect or hinders parents to seek professional help for their children who suffered from mental health problems. In addition to this, the results of the pilot study is conducted is analyzed by the use of content analysis.  In the pilot study, through a questionnaire, 15 parents with their young children has asked to provide information regarding different factors due to which they do not seek professional help for their children. From the pilot study responses five major barriers are included in the questionnaire. It is found that parents seek professional help for the mental health problem in their children if they observe any behavioral problem in their children. The researcher has used Likert 7 point scale for the purpose of collection of the information related to the factors that affects the intention of the parents to seek professional help ranging from very unlikely to very likely (Galdas, Cheater & Marshall, 2005).

In addition to this, responses are also collected on the five point scale that range from ambivalent to low intenders. In addition to this, there are also other factors that affect the intention of the parents to consider professional help which is regarded as family socio-demographic factors which include language spoken at home, family income, family living arrangements, marriage status, family income and so on. Besides this, the researcher has also assigned a SEIFA index of relative disadvantage score to each family by the way of home address postal code. By the use of statistical tools, a comparison is made between parents that have positive help seeking intentions with the parents that have low help seeking intentions if their child has a mental health problem (Zimmerman, 2005).

In this research study, the researcher has used appropriate data collection methods such as observation and survey through questionnaire method (Eiraldi, et al.2006). Both these methods are regarded as primary data collection methods and results in the collection of the information at first hand from the respondents. Besides this, the collected data by the use of primary sources is being used for a specific purpose. It facilitates in gaining information related to the current scenario of the research problem. There is also a need for the recommendations provided for the purpose of reducing the occurrence of the mental health problems in children at early stages. Besides this, there is also a need of providing information for the direction to the future researchers on the research topic. Exploratory research design is being used by the researcher in this research study as it helps in exploring the different aspects of the research topic. Besides this, deductive research approach is being used in which the information is collected in general and appropriate deductions have been made in order to arrive at the specific information related to the research study. This research study is limited to Australia (Komiya, Good & Sherrod, 2000).

In addition to this, comparison is also made between the parents who have recognized that their child has more difficulties than their peers and the parents that recognized their child does not have any mental problem.  Along with this, the comparison is also made among the parents that seek professional help and parents that do not seek professional help when their child has mental health problems. In order to compare, regression analysis have been conducted for the purpose of finding the relationship between the professional help and barriers that affect the intentions of the parents. It is found out that from the whole sample 86 6 year old children have mental health problems as per the CBCL Total problem scale. From these only one third parents have seek professional help for their children mental health problems. In addition to this, only few parents have seek professional help for their children that do not have mental problem due to behavior problems (Rickwood, Deane & Wilson, 2007).

Only 14 children out of total sample that have mental problem seek the professional help for their children. The filters have been assigned include parent’s help seeking intentions. It is also found out that the children that are recognized as have a mental problem, parents have a positive intention towards seeking professional help at the age of 6 years.  Only few of the respondents have considered as low help seekers for their child who have mental problems. The second filter is the recognition of the parents that they have a child with difficult behavior than average. It is estimated that only few of the parents have recognized that their child has a mental problem and there is a need to seek help from professionals (Gulliver, Griffiths & Christensen, 2010).

Less than one third of the parents have accessed professional help when their child is in need due to presence of mental health problems. Along with this, there is also an application of logistic regression model that provides information regarding the fact that the most significant predictor of children in need of the professional help is the recognition of their parents that there is a need to take professional help to provide cure to mental health problems faced by children. It is found that very few children have received professional help to cure their mental health problems. Only few parents accessed professional help from different professionals for their children that face mental health problems.

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