Age differences in physical activity with regard to motivational regulation types in youth sport

Poster (2020, October 21)

A decline in physical activity (PA) with increasing age has been reported consistently (e.g., Bassett et al., 2015). In this sense, physical education (PE) has become a key issue to intercept youth, in ... [more ▼]

A decline in physical activity (PA) with increasing age has been reported consistently (e.g., Bassett et al., 2015). In this sense, physical education (PE) has become a key issue to intercept youth, in order to promote PA at an early age. To reduce the research gap with regard to the underlying mechanisms of this decline, we investigated the role of age for motivational aspects of the self-determination theory (Deci & Ryan, 2000) concerning scholars’ basic needs (competence, relatedness, autonomy; Vlachopoulos, Ntoumanis, & Smith, 2010), PE teacher need-support (Standage, Duda, & Ntoumanis, 2005), and different motivational regulation types during PE (Vlachopoulos, Katartzi, Kontou, Moustaka, & Goudas, 2011). As a transfer of motivational regulation types from PE towards a leisure-time context has been found (Hagger & Chatzisarantis, 2016), this study furthermore analyzed the role of age in an out-of-school PA environment (Markland & Tobin, 2004). In total, 1889 scholars (50.9% males; 10 to 23 years) from 14 different schools participated in the study. Consistent with previous findings, the self-reported PA decreased with age. Further regression analysis revealed that the feeling of being competent during PE decreased with age, while the feeling of being autonomous increased. No differences regarding age and need-support during PE were found. Regarding the motivational regulation types during PE, the internal motivation decreased with age, while the external motivation increased. Concerning the leisure-time context, all motivational regulation types towards PA decreased with age. SEM-Models confirmed the significant relationship between motivational regulation types from PE to a leisure-time context. Overall, results suggest that a decrease of PA with age might be related to a decrease of internal motivation forms as years go by. Implications for promoting beneficial motivational regulation types during PE related to the age of scholars will be displayed. [less ▲]

Sporty summer and lazy winter? PA of youth from a seasonal perspective.

in Dela, Flemming; Müller, Erich; Tsolakidis, Elias (Eds.) Book of Abstracts (2020, October)

Objectives: Many children in Europe are insufficiently active (1), which makes the promotion of children´s physical activity (PA) a critical health promotion target. However, there are some uncontrollable ... [more ▼]

Objectives: Many children in Europe are insufficiently active (1), which makes the promotion of children´s physical activity (PA) a critical health promotion target. However, there are some uncontrollable factors such as amount of daylight, weather conditions, temperatures and precipitation levels that might influence PA behavior (2). Conditions for moderate to vigorous physical activity (MVPA) seem to be optimal when the environmental temperature ranges between 20°C and 25°C (3). This study aims to examine if the season is related to the objectively measured PA of youth of Luxembourg. Methods: 150 youth (90 females and 60 males) aged from 10–17 (M = 12.37, SD = 2.14) years participated in this longitudinal study, which took place at two measurement periods, the first between October and December (winter) and the second between May and July (summer). PA behavior was objectively assessed by wearing an accelerometer (ActiGraph GT3X-BT) for seven consecutive days. Daily time spent in MVPA was calculated as an indicator of the youth’s PA behavior. Results: A repeated measures ANOVA revealed a significant seasonal effect for MVPA per day (F(1, 1136.66) = 9.14, p < .05, partial η² = .06). More minutes of MVPA per day were accrued in summer (M = 53.24, SD = 21.40) than in winter (M = 49.04, SD = 20.88). Both in winter and in summer, MVPA per day differed significantly between females and males (winter: t(148) = 5.83, p < .001; summer: t(148) = 4.85, p < .001), whereby females (winter: M = 41.70, SD = 15.89; summer: M = 46.79, SD = 17.26) showed significantly fewer minutes in MVPA per day than males (winter: M = 60.05, SD = 22.67; summer: M = 62.91, SD = 23.43). However, there was no significant interaction between season and gender, F(1, 89.85) = .723, p = .397). Discussion: According to the results of this study, youth are less physically active in winter than in summer. Therefore, schools, sports clubs and communities should offer special PA programs for this season, which are independent from climatic conditions and equally suitable for females and males. Measuring PA throughout the year enables to monitor the activity behavior more accurate and may help in developing such programs. [less ▲]

Zur Bedeutsamkeit des Sportunterrichtes: Der Einfluss der Motivation im Sportunterricht auf den außerschulischen Kontext - ein longitudinaler Ansatz

Scientific Conference (2020, May 22)

Hintergrund: Hinsichtlich der kontinuierlichen Abnahme der körperlichen Aktivität von Kindern und Jugendlichen, rückt die Stärkung der Motivation als Ansatz zur Sportaktivierung immer mehr in den Fokus ... [more ▼]

Hintergrund: Hinsichtlich der kontinuierlichen Abnahme der körperlichen Aktivität von Kindern und Jugendlichen, rückt die Stärkung der Motivation als Ansatz zur Sportaktivierung immer mehr in den Fokus (Standage, Duda, & Ntoumanis, 2005). In ihrem trans-kontextuellen Modell postulieren Hagger und Chatzisarantis (2016) einen Zusammenhang zwischen intrinsischer Motivation im Sportunterricht und in der Freizeit. Dabei spielt die Unterstützung der Bedürfnisse durch die Sportlehrkraft eine wichtige Rolle, um die intrinsische Motivation der SchülerInnen im Sportunterricht und längerfristig in der Freizeit zu fördern, welche ein selbstbestimmtes körperliches Aktivitätsverhalten begünstigen soll. In der vorliegenden Studie wurden diese Annahmen in erweiterter Form im Längsschnitt geprüft. Methode: Es wurden N = 1681 SchülerInnen zwischen 10 und 23 Jahren (M = 14.7 Jahre; 50.7% weiblich) aus 14 luxemburgischen Schulen zu Beginn des Schuljahres (t1) und sechs Monate später am Ende des Schuljahres (t2) getestet. Neben der wahrgenommenen Bedürfnisunterstützung (Standage, Duda, & Ntoumanis, 2005) wurden die Motivationsregulation im Sportunterricht (PLOC-R; Vlachopoulos, Katartzi, Kontou, Moustaka, & Goudas, 2011) und in der Freizeit (BREQ-II; Markland & Tobin, 2004), sowie alle Konstrukte der Theorie des geplanten Handelns (Ajzen, 1991), und die körperliche Aktivität erhoben. Ergebnisse: Cross-Lagged-Panel Analysen zeigen, dass die intrinsische Motivation im Sportunterricht (t1) kontextübergreifend die intrinsische Motivation zur körperlichen Aktivität in der Freizeit (t2) vorhersagt (β = .12, p < .05). Selbiger Befund konnte auch für die Amotivation gefunden werden (β = .15, p < .05). Allerdings wurde kein kontextübergreifender Zusammenhang der extrinsischen Motivation gefunden (p > .05). Entgegen der postulierten Richtung des Modells, sagt eine höhere intrinsische Motivation der SchülerInnen (t1) eine höhere Wahrnehmung der Unterstützung der Grundbedürfnisse durch den Sportlehrer (t2) vorher (β = .10, p < .05). Die intrinsische Motivation in der Freizeit (t1) hängt zudem mit der Einstellung (β = .24, p < .05), subjektiven Norm (β = .11, p < .05), wahrgenommenen Verhaltenskontrolle (β = .12, p < .05), Intention (β = .16, p < .05) und der körperlichen Aktivität (β = .18, p < .05) zu t2 zusammen. Schlussfolgerung: Die Befunde bestätigen die Bedeutsamkeit des Sportunterrichts in dem Sinne, dass die intrinsische Motivation im Sportunterricht die Wahrnehmung der Bedürfnisunterstützung des Sportlehrers erhöht und kontextübergreifend mit der intrinsischen Motivation im Freizeitbereich zusammenhängt, welche wiederum ein selbstbestimmtes körperliches Aktivitätsverhalten in der Freizeit positiv bedingt. Eine Interventionsstudie im Sportunterricht bekräftigt diese Befunde in dem Sinne, dass die Autoren positivere Effekte fanden, wenn, zusätzlich zur alleinigen Autonomieunterstützung, internale Zielsetzungen in der Lehre eingesetzt wurden (Cheon, Reeve, & Song, 2019). [less ▲]

Differences in physical activity among children with physically active and inactive parents

Scientific Conference (2019, September 13)

Objectives: Parental physical activity is considered as positively related to children´s physical activity (PA; Sallis, Prochaska & Taylor, 2000). Since parents serve as role models, have the potential to ... [more ▼]

Objectives: Parental physical activity is considered as positively related to children´s physical activity (PA; Sallis, Prochaska & Taylor, 2000). Since parents serve as role models, have the potential to influence the health-related behavior and, for instance, to alter a mainly sedentary lifestyle of their children (Beets, Cardinal & Alderman, 2010), the impact of parental PA has become a key issue in research. Many studies report associations between parental PA and the PA behavior of their children, e.g., the direct involvement of the parents in activities with their children is related to increased levels of their PA (Adkins, Sherwood, Story, & Davis, 2004; Beets, Vogel, Chapman, Pitetti, & Cardinal, 2007). However, the mechanisms of parental influence are still poorly understood and besides recent studies are based on self-reported data. Therefore, this study aims to examine if parental PA is related to the subjectively and objectively measured PA of their children. Methods: 237 Luxembourgish children and adolescents (134 girls and 103 boys) aged from 10-18 years participated in the study. Via a digital questionnaire, the children indicated if their mother and father are physically active on a regular basis and if they are active together with their parents. Furthermore, the children and adolescents indicated if they are active at least 60 minutes/ day and if they own a membership in a sports club (MoMo physical activity questionnaire). Additionally, children’s PA behavior was objectively assessed by wearing an accelerometer (ActiGraph GT3X-BT) for a period of seven consecutive days. Activity was categorized as sedentary, light physical activity or moderate to vigorous physical activity (MVPA) using age-specific thresholds. Results: A multivariate ANOVA revealed significant differences in self-reported physical activity if the mother was physically active (F (2, 166) = 5.4, p < .01). Thus, children reported subjectively higher daily activity duration (p < .05) and more activities in a regular week (p < .01). There was no impact on self-reported PA if the father was active or the children were active with their parents together. Regarding the objective data, there were no significant differences between children with active parents and children with inactive parents. If the parents were active with their children together there were significant differences (F (3, 229) = 3.2, p < .05), thus MVPA per day was higher (p < .05) and the sedentary time was lower (p < .01). Neither subjective nor objective data revealed gender-specific differences. Discussion: In contrast to other studies, only the mother seems to have an influence on the subjective PA behavior of the children. The fact, that parents being active or in a sports club does not appear to enhance the PA of the children objectively. However, the objective PA is merely affected by being active together. According to this finding, joint activities of parents and children seem to be necessary to promote children’s PA effectively. It is important to note that in our study the parental PA was rated by the children. In future studies, parents should be included via self-report questionnaires and/or accelerometer. [less ▲]

Overestimation of physical activity among young people: Does age and gender play a role?

Scientific Conference (2019, June 22)

Background and purpose: Due to the continuous decrease of physical activity (PA) of people in industrialized countries (Kohl et al., 2012), PA behavior and its psychological foundations has become a key ... [more ▼]

Background and purpose: Due to the continuous decrease of physical activity (PA) of people in industrialized countries (Kohl et al., 2012), PA behavior and its psychological foundations has become a key issue in health-related research. Studies show that most people tend to overesti-mate their habitual PA (Skender et al., 2016), however, there is very little research on the role of demographic variables in this respect. Therefore, the aim of this study was to examine whether age and/or gender affect the (over)estimation of PA among children and adolescents. Methods: Data of 75 students (38 girls and 37 boys, 10 to 18 years) of various primary and sec-ondary schools were randomly included in the study. Habitual PA was assessed through an online self-report questionnaire (Schmidt et al., 2017) as well as by wearing an accelerometer (Acti-Graph GT3X-BT) over seven consecutive days. A multiple regression analysis was used to ana-lyze the impact of age and gender on the accuracy of PA estimation. Results: The students reported being active for at least 60 minutes on average on 4,0 ± 2,1 days per week, whereas the accelerometer data verify only 1,8 ± 1,6 days per week. Thus, a majority of 76% of the children and adolescents overestimated and 9% underestimated their PA. Almost 15% were correct in their PA estimation. However, results of the regression analysis indicate neither an effect of age ( = .003, p > .1) nor of gender ( = -.070, p > .1). Conclusions: Overestimation of PA is common not only among adults but also among children and adolescents. However, this misperception appears to be independent of age and gender, at least in the age group considered here. Future studies should examine further demographic and psychological variables in order to explain why most of the people significantly overestimate their habitual PA. [less ▲]

Competence support in physical education: a predictor towards a more self-determined physical activity behavior?

Scientific Conference (2019, May 22)

Objectives: Given a widespread continuous decrease in children’s and adolescents’ physical activity (PA), the potential of physical education (PE) in promoting young people’s PA motivation and behavior ... [more ▼]

Objectives: Given a widespread continuous decrease in children’s and adolescents’ physical activity (PA), the potential of physical education (PE) in promoting young people’s PA motivation and behavior has become a key issue. Research in line with the trans-contextual model highlights the support of perceived autonomy in PE as a significant predictor for self-determined PA behavior in a leisure-time (LT) context (Hagger et al., 2003). However, the impact of competence and relatedness support still remains unclear. Therefore, the present study aimed to investigate the role of support during PE, differentiated into three basic needs for behavioral regulation in PE and LT. It was expected that, in addition to perceived autonomy, competence and relatedness would be relevant predictors. Method: 244 students (139 girls) from Luxembourg, ranging from 11 to 21 years, participated in the study. Via a digital questionnaire, the scales need support (perceived autonomy, competence and relatedness; Standage, Duda, & Ntoumanis, 2005), basic needs (BPNES; Vlachopoulos, Ntoumanis, & Smith, 2010), and external and intrinsic motivation in PE (PLOC-R; Vlachopoulos et al., 2011) as well as in LT (BREQ-II; Markland & Tobin, 2004) were applied in the classroom. With regard to the theory of planned behavior (Ajzen, 1985), the attitudes, perceived behavioral control, and intentions toward PA were assessed (Hagger et al., 2003). Results: A SEM analysis showed that competence support in PE was the major predictor for self-determined behavior in PE, while perceived autonomy produced mixed findings. Relatedness support had a negative effect on external regulated behavior in PE. In accordance with the assumptions of the trans-contextual model, similar behavioral regulations in PE and LT were found. Furthermore, a more self-determined behavior in LT predicted higher attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control towards PA, which increased the intention of doing sports. Discussion: Results suggest that the children’s perceived support of competence from the teacher during PE is an important factor to increase self-determined PA behavior. Further intervention programs may focus on improving the perception of competence during PE in order to increase motivation. In addition, these findings underline the importance for future research to consider the different roles of perceived support of competence, autonomy and relatedness in PE. [less ▲]

Physical activity of students in Luxembourg on days with and without physical education and during physical education

Scientific Conference (2018, December)

Das Palux-Projekt in Luxemburg: Forschungsdesign und erste Ergebnisse einer Pilotstudie

in Bartsch, Fabienne; Mombeck, Mona; Müller, Merle (Eds.) et al Tägliche Herausforderungen meistern - Sportlehrkräfte im Fokus (2018, October)