Impacts of active school design on school-time sedentary behavior and physical activity: A pilot natural experiment

Jeri Brittin; Leah Frerichs; John R Sirard; Nancy M Wells; Beth M Myers; Jeanette Garcia; Dina Sorensen; Matthew J Trowbridge; Terry Huang

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0189236

Impacts of active school design on school-time sedentary behavior and physical activity: A pilot natural experiment

PLoS One. 2017 Dec 7;12(12):e0189236. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0189236. eCollection 2017.

Authors

Jeri Brittin^{1

2}, Leah Frerichs³, John R Sirard⁴, Nancy M Wells⁵, Beth M Myers⁵, Jeanette Garcia⁶, Dina Sorensen⁷, Matthew J Trowbridge⁸, Terry Huang⁹

Affiliations

¹ HDR, Department of Built Environment Research, Omaha, NE, United States of America.
² University of Nebraska-Lincoln, College of Architecture, Department of Interior Design, Lincoln, NE, United States of America.
³ University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, School of Public Health, Department of Health Policy and Management, Chapel Hill, NC, United States of America.
⁴ University of Massachusetts-Amherst, School of Public Health and Health Sciences, Department of Kinesiology, Amherst, MA, United States of America.
⁵ Cornell University, College of Human Ecology, Department of Design and Environmental Analysis, Ithaca, NY, United States of America.
⁶ University of Central Florida, College of Education and Human Sciences, Department of Educational and Human Services, Orlando, FL, United States of America.
⁷ VMDO Architects, Charlottesville, VA, United States of America.
⁸ University of Virginia, School of Medicine, Department of Emergency Medicine, Charlottesville, VA, United States of America.
⁹ City University of New York, School of Public Health, Graduate Center, New York, NY, United States of America.

Abstract

Background: Children spend a significant portion of their days in sedentary behavior (SB) and on average fail to engage in adequate physical activity (PA). The school built environment may influence SB and PA, but research is limited. This natural experiment evaluated whether an elementary school designed to promote movement impacted students' school-time SB and PA.

Methods: Accelerometers measured SB and PA at pre and post time-points in an intervention group who moved to the new school (n = 21) and in a comparison group experiencing no school environmental change (n = 20). Difference-in-difference (DD) analysis examined SB and PA outcomes in these groups. Measures were also collected post-intervention from an independent, grade-matched group of students in the new school (n = 21).

Results: As expected, maturational increases in SB were observed. However, DD analysis estimated that the intervention attenuated increase in SB by 81.2 ± 11.4 minutes/day (p<0.001), controlling for time in moderate to vigorous physical activity (MVPA). The intervention was also estimated to increase daily number of breaks from SB by 23.4 ± 2.6 (p < .001) and to increase light physical activity (LPA) by 67.7 ± 10.7 minutes/day (p<0.001). However, the intervention decreased MVPA by 10.3 ± 2.3 minutes/day (p<0.001). Results of grade-matched independent samples analysis were similar, with students in the new vs. old school spending 90.5 ± 16.1 fewer minutes/day in SB, taking 21.1 ± 2.7 more breaks from SB (p<0.001), and spending 64.5 ± 14.8 more minutes in LPA (p<0.001), controlling for time in MVPA. Students in the new school spent 13.1 ± 2.7 fewer minutes in MVPA (p<0.001) than their counterparts in the old school.

Conclusions: This pilot study found that active school design had beneficial effects on SB and LPA, but not on MVPA. Mixed results point to a need for active classroom design strategies to mitigate SB, and quick access from classrooms to areas permissive of high-intensity activities to promote MVPA. Integrating active design with programs/policies to promote PA may yield greatest impact on PA of all intensities.

MeSH terms

Child
Exercise*
Female
Humans
Male
Pilot Projects
Schools*
Sedentary Behavior*
Virginia

Grants and funding

The work in Virginia was partially supported by funding from Youth-Nex, the Center to Promote Effective Youth Development at the University of Virginia (co-PIs: Huang and Trowbridge). The New York data collection (PI: Wells) was funded in part by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation through its Active Living Research Program (#69550). Federal funding was provided by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) through the Food & Nutrition Service (FNS) People's Garden pilot program (Project #CN-CGP-11-0047) and by the Cornell University Agricultural Experiment Station (Hatch funds) (#NYC-327- 465) and Cornell Cooperative Extension (Smith Lever funds) through the National Institutes for Food and Agriculture (NIFA) USDA. Additional funding for the New York data came from: Cornell University's Atkinson Center for a Sustainable Future (ACSF); The College of Human Ecology, Cornell University; The Bronfenbrenner Center for Translational Research (BCTR), Cornell University; and the Cornell Cooperative Extension Summer Intern Program. Funding organizations played no role in the design, implementation, or publication of this study. HDR and VMDO provided support in the form of salaries for JB and DS, respectively, but did not have any additional role in the study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.