Poster #31 - Direct and Indirect Influences on Physical Development in Chinese Children

• In Event: Poster Session 03

Abstract

Over the past two years, China's Ministry of Education has introduced several policies that has shifted the focus of education system from the academic work to the promotion of physical development in children. This study extended existing research aiming to identify individual characteristics, physical education (PE) in school and parental support that contribute to better physical development in Chinese children by exploring pathways that may explain the developmental impacts of both individual and environmental factors.
Using a large random sample of 4511 fourth graders (age=10.2±.6y, 54.2% boys) from Guangzhou, China, the present study investigated the direct and indirect influences of a group predictors on physical development (PD). The eight predictors included: SES, sleep duration, frequency of taking breakfast, children’s grit, physical activity (PA) out-of-class, engagement in PE class, the number of PE classes arranged by school, and parental support on PA. Based on the National student physical health standard, PD was assessed by a battery of measures including students' lung capacity, BMI, performance on 50-meter dash, sit-and-reach, 1-minute jumping rope, and 1-minute sit-up tests. The SES index was calculated by applying principal component analysis to: father’s and mother's' education, father’s and mother’s occupations, and home possessions. Grit was adopted from the Short Grit Scale (Duckworth, et al., 2009) suggesting the level of general perseverance (alpha=.90).
Structural equation modeling was used to examine if there were direct effects of all eight predictors on PD, and indirect effects of individual grit, PE classes, and parental support. Gender was entered as a covariate on PD to account for potential sex differences. The model fitting results were shown in Table 1. The initial model was shown in Figure 1, and the reduced model was the one without the non-significant paths.
As shown in Figure 1, the SES (b=.14, p<0.01) and PA out-of-class (b=.11, p<0.01) played more important role in PD. The sleep duration (b=.01, p=.70) didn't make significant contribution to PD in current sample. Grit was associated both directly (b=.04, p=0.04) and indirectly (through PA out-of-class, b=.14, p<.01) with PD, while the indirect association was stronger. PD was not directly influenced by the number of PE classes arranged by school (b=.02, p=.43), but by its indirect impacts through stimulating children’s PA out-of-class (b=.21, p<0.01) and engagement in PE class (b=.10, p<0.01). The parental support on PA could both directly (b=.08, p<0.01) and indirectly influence PD, and the indirect effects were stronger and exerted through PA out-of-class (b=.17, p<0.01) and engagement in PE class (b=.12, p<0.01).
In sum, the current study revealed that children with higher levels of SES and PA had better PD. Taking breakfast might be more important than having more sleep for PD. Educators and parents could pay more attention to PA out-of-school and engagement in PE class, since both school's PE classes and parental support exerted influence on PD through them. The current study allowed novel insights into tailoring intervention programs for promoting PD in Chinese children.

Authors

• Manjie Wang, 17 Education and Technology Group
  Presenting Author

• Yan Li

• Yingying Liu

• Jiakun Liu