The Effect of Increased Physical Activity on Adolescents' Health and Academic Performance: The School in Motion Study
- Conditions
- Mental HealthPhysical ActivityAcademic Achievement
- Interventions
- Behavioral: Physical educationBehavioral: Be happyBehavioral: Physical active learningBehavioral: Physical activity
- Registration Number
- NCT03817047
- Lead Sponsor
- Norwegian School of Sport Sciences
- Brief Summary
This study evaluates the effect of 120 minutes extra of physical education (PE) or physical activity (PA) on adolescents' physical health, mental health, academic performance and learning environment. This is a cluster-randomized controlled trial with three arms, where the participants in two of the groups will have different models of increased PE/PA during the school week, whereas the participants in the third arm is the control group including current practice.
- Detailed Description
This is a school-based, three-arm cluster randomized controlled trial (RCT) recruiting adolescents from secondary schools in Norway. Adolescents (aged 14-15 years) were the unit of analysis, and schools (clusters) were randomly assigned to one of three conditions:
1. the physical active learning group (PAL-group), where the schools each week include one additional physical education (PE) lesson, 30 minutes of physical active learning, and 30 minutes of physical activity (intervention condition);
2. the don't worry - be happy group (DWBH-group), where the schools include one new activity class (60 minutes: Be Happy class) and one additional PE-class (60 minutes: Don't Worry class) per week (intervention condition);or
3. current practice (control condition). An identical set of outcome measures are taken from all participants at baseline, and approximately 12 months after the baseline measures, when the participants were at the end of year 9
Recruitment & Eligibility
- Status
- COMPLETED
- Sex
- All
- Target Recruitment
- 2045
- Subjects enrolled in 9th grade
- None
Study & Design
- Study Type
- INTERVENTIONAL
- Study Design
- PARALLEL
- Arm && Interventions
Group Intervention Description Don't worry - be happy Be happy Two components: 1. Physical education (60 minutes) - don't worry class 2. Physical activity (60 minutes) - be happy class Physical active learning (PAL) Physical activity Three components: 1. Physical education (60 minutes) 2. Physical active learning (30 minutes) 3. Physical activity (30 minutes) Don't worry - be happy Physical education Two components: 1. Physical education (60 minutes) - don't worry class 2. Physical activity (60 minutes) - be happy class Physical active learning (PAL) Physical education Three components: 1. Physical education (60 minutes) 2. Physical active learning (30 minutes) 3. Physical activity (30 minutes) Physical active learning (PAL) Physical active learning Three components: 1. Physical education (60 minutes) 2. Physical active learning (30 minutes) 3. Physical activity (30 minutes)
- Primary Outcome Measures
Name Time Method Mean physical activity level Measured baseline and after 12 months The participants mean physical activity level measured by accelerometers
- Secondary Outcome Measures
Name Time Method Time spent in moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) Measured baseline and after 12 months Mean minutes spent in MVPA per day
Time spent sedentary Measured baseline and after 12 months Mean minutes spent sedentary each day, measured both objectively using accelerometers
Sedentary behaviour Measured baseline and after 12 months Self-reported in a questionnaire. There are questions related to minutes spent in front of a screen. The answers are categorized into seven alternatives ranging from "No time at all" to "More than 6 hours per day". There are also questions about which screen activity they perform. The answers are categorized into six alternatives ranging from "No time at all" to "More than 3 hours per day". There are also questions about time spent doing homework. The answers are categorized into nine alternatives ranging from "No time at all" to " More than 7 hours per day".
Upper limb strength Measured baseline and after 12 months Handgrip strength using a hand dynamometer. The participants will use the dominant hand, with the arm completely extended and squeeze the dynamometer with maximum isometric effort, for about 2-3 seconds.
Explosive strength in the lower body Measured baseline and after 12 months Standing broad jump. The participants will stand behind a line with feet slightly apart. They will be instructed to perform a two-foot take-off and landing, and to jump as far as possible, landing on both feet without falling backwards. The distance from the take-off line to the nearest point of contact on the landing (back of the heels) will be measured, and the better of two attempts will be used for analyses.
Abdominal muscle endurance Measured baseline and after 12 months Abdominal muscular endurance will be measured by a sit-up test. The participant will start in a lying position with hands clasped behind the neck, knees bent at a 45° angle with the heels and feet flat on the floor and held down by the tester. The subject then rise to a position with the elbows pointed forward until they touched the knees. The total number of correctly performed and completed sit-ups within 30 seconds is counted.
Cardiorespiratory fitness Measured baseline and after 12 months Intermittent running test. Participants run for 10 minutes, and the distance covered (in meters) is recorded.
Overall psychosocial problems and strengths Measured baseline and after 12 months Assessed with the Strength and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ). This is a short screening instrument consisting of 25 items equally divided across five scales measuring emotional symptoms, conduct problems, hyperactivity-inattention, peer problems, and prosocial behavior.
Each statement is answered as "Not true", "Somewhat true" and "Certainly true". Some questions have reversed form, which is reversed in the scoring of the instrument. Replies were scored from 0 to 2, and the subscales are summed to a score ranging from 0-10 for each subscale. Added together, the first four scores generate a total difficulties score, ranging from 0 to 40. Higher scores indicate more problems.Adolescents' subjective health and well-being Measured baseline and after 12 months Adolescent's subjective health and well-being is assessed using the Kidscreen-27 questionnaire. The instrument consists of 27 items covering the following five quality of life dimensions: 1) physical well-being (5 items), 2) psychological well-being (7 items), 3) parents/guardians relations \& autonomy (7 items), 4) social support \& peers (4 items), and 5) school environment (5 items).
The questions are answered on a 5-point likert scale. Scores can be created for each of the five dimensions. The methodology given in the developers manual will be used to obtain the T-scores; mean (±SD) scores of 50 ± 10 define normality for children and adolescents aged 8-18 years across Europe. Higher scores indicate a better health-related quality of life.Academic performance in reading Measured baseline and after 9 months Specific standardized Norwegian National tests in reading.The test is designed and administrated by The Norwegian Directorate for Education and Training.
Academic performance in numeracy Measured baseline and after 9 months Specific standardized Norwegian National tests in numeracy. The test is designed and administrated by The Norwegian Directorate for Education and Training.
The adolescents domain specific self-evaluation of competence or adequacy Measured baseline and after 12 months Assessed through Harter's Self-perception Profile for Adolescents (SPPA). The instrument consists of seven subscales covering the following domains: 1) scholastic competence, 2) social competence, 3) athletic competence, 4) physical appearance, 5) job competence, 6) close friendship, and 7) romantic appeal.
Each subscale contains four items, each having four options: 1 (Describes me very poorly), 2 (Describes me fairly poorly), 3 (Describes me fairly well), and 4 (Describes me very well), providing a mean score of perceived competence in that area, ranging from 1 (lowest level of self-esteem) to 4 (highest level of self-esteem).Symptoms of anxiety and depression Measured baseline and after 12 months Assessed by the short version of Hopkins Symptom Checklist (HSCL-10). HSCL-10 consists of 10 symptoms or problems that people sometimes have in which adolescents answered how much the symptoms have bothered or distressed them during the last week.
All 10 questions have 4 response categories: 'Not at all', 'A little', 'Quite a bit' and 'Extremely'. The responses are summarized across all items and the mean score is used as a measure of psychological distress. Higher values indicates higher psychological distress.Learning environment in the classroom Measured baseline and after 12 months The Classroom Climate Scale is used to assess learning environment. This instrument consist of 22 questions related to intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, anticipation and teacher-student relations.
All questions are answered on a four-point scale: "Strongly agree", "Somewhat agree", "Somewhat disagree", "Strongly disagree". All points are summed to a total score. Higher scores indicates higher classroom environment.School environment Measured baseline and after 12 months Learning environment at school in general is self-reported in a questionnaire. It consist of three separate questions, and the questions are answered on a 7-point likert scale ranging from "totally disagree" to "totally agree". A mean score from the three questions will be made, and a higher score indicates better school environment.
Trial Locations
- Locations (1)
Norwegian School of Sport Sciences
🇳🇴Oslo, Norway