Measures

Originally developed for use in the Stanford Five-City Project in the early 1980s, the PAR is a semi-structured interview that estimates an individual's time spent in physical activity, strength, and flexibility activities for the 7 days prior to the interview. The general interview format is as follows: An interviewer asks the participant to recall time spent sleeping and doing physical activities for the past 7 days. The interviewer guides the participant through the recall process, day-by-day, to determine duration and intensity of the physical activities.

The main aim of ASAP, a project developed for The California Endowment (TCE), was to develop a series of publications that could be used by diverse stakeholders in their attempts to promote best practice and policy in school PE. Following review of these materials and discussion with key stakeholders, recommendations were made to TCE for priorities and next steps to advance PE policy in California.

Published in 2011, this comprehensive accelerometer data collection, data screening, and data processing manual was created as part of the Neighborhood Quality of Life and the Senior Neighborhood Quality of Life Studies, both of which used mail delivery and retrieval methods. It was started in 2002 and is based on the cumulative experience of our research team.

Conducted from 2004-2005, the Active Where? Study was designed to develop new measures of environmental correlates of diet and physical activity specifically for youth. The environments of interest were home, community, and school. Three different sites were involved in this study in order make the findings more generalizable. These sites were in: San Diego, California; Cincinnati, Ohio; and Boston, Massachusetts. A survey was administered to a sample of adolescents, parents of these adolescents, and parents of a sample of children. The Active Where? Surveys assess home, neighborhood, park, and school environments related to physical activity and eating. The study was supported by Active Living Research (ALR), a program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

*Jim to add text*

Funded by the Cowles Foundation from 1996-2000, the Amherst Health and Activity Study (AHA) assessed physical activity and health habits of children and teenagers and family and friend support for these habits. Adults and children were surveyed regarding physical activity type and frequency, environmental factors, household influences, physical activity of adults in the household, the household demographics, the child’s friends, the social support and exercise, and social support and exercise. This was one of the first studies to use accelerometers in a large study.

The Audit of Physical Activity Resources for Seniors (APARS) assessed the physical activity environment in Senior Living Residences (SLRs). Audits were conducted in 29 SLRs and inter-rater reliability was assessed.

The BEACHES system was used to observe and code physical activity and eating behaviors, as well as their social and physical context, for the research project Social Learning of Diet and Physical Activity in Children, funded by the Heart, Lung, and Blood Division of National Institutes of Health from 1986-1991.

Contact: Thomas L. McKenzie, Ph.D., Department of Exercise and Nutritional Sciences, San Diego State University, San Diego, California, 92182 (tmckenzie@sdsu.edu).

Created in 1995, the CHEW is an observational measure of environments in and around worksites that may affect health behaviors. It is based on an ecological perspective that emphasizes effects of physical environments, social environments, and policies. Detailed assessments of factors that can encourage or discourage physical activity and healthful eating behaviors are conducted. Limited assessment of factors that might influence smoking and alcohol use are included in the measure. The CHEW was developed for use in the Australian National Workplace Health Project.

Our research team conducted an evaluation of the first major Open Streets events in San Diego (CicloSDias), which was held on Sunday August 11, 2013. The CicloSDias evaluation was funded by the California Endowment. The aims of the evaluation were to document attendance rates, gauge reach and marketing, and assess impacts on social cohesion, businesses, and physical activity. The evaluation consisted of counts of event attendees, intercept surveys of event attendees (some survey questions were presented on large posters), surveys of businesses along the route, and a city-wide survey before and after the event. A report of the evaluation results can be found on the publications page, under the heading 'CicloSDias'.

The EAPRS Measurement Tool provides a comprehensive direct observation assessment of the physical environments of parks and playgrounds, with an emphasis on evaluating physical elements and qualities with respect to their functionality or potential functionality (e.g., how a park or playground element is used or could be used by adults and children).

We developed youth and adult group leader surveys to assess knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors around youth empowerment and advocacy, as well as health behaviors (e.g., physical activity and healthy eating).  The youth surveys can be administered before and after training for youth groups in advocacy for nutrition and physical activity environment and policy changes.

This project, conducted from 1984-1990, tested the effectiveness of a family-based health behavior change intervention in two ethnic groups. The aim was to help family members initiate and maintain dietary and physical activity behaviors believed to be linked to risk factors for cardiovascular disease. A multi-part survey was used to evaluate program outcomes and psychosocial mediators.

Grocery Store Promotion Tool: A tool to measure the food promotion environment in grocery stores to investigate how food placement and signage can influence purchasing and consumption, particularly for youth. GroPromo was validated by comparing individual grocery receipts and to the store's promotions and displays.

A study of culturally-specific parental prompts to smoke among youth. Previous work with Latino youth indicated that Latino parents, more so than non-Latinos, may prompt their children to engage in behaviors putting them in direct contact with cigarettes or inadvertently encourage them to "practice" smoking-related behaviors. As part of a larger prospective study examining these prompts as smoking initiation risk factors, this study documented the extent of parental prompts. 

The purpose of the International Physical Activity Questionnaires (IPAQ) is to provide a set of well-developed instruments that can be used internationally to obtain comparable estimates of physical activity. There are two versions of the questionnaire. The short version is suitable for use in national and regional surveillance systems and the long version provides more detailed information often required in research work or for evaluation purposes. The long version produces estimates of physical activity in four domains: work, leisure, transportation and household.

The Microscale Audit of Pedestrian Streetscapes (MAPS) was developed to collect audit data on the pedestrian environment and walkability in neighborhoods.

Funded by NIH-NHLBI, 1996-2000. MSPAN (24 schools, 9 districts) was designed to increase physical activity opportunities throughout the school day, increase MVPA in PE classes, and decrease the consumption of fat on middle school campuses. Only environment and policy interventions were used, because they were the least studied intervention approaches. Surveys included self- and parent-reports of outcomes, exposure to the intervention, and parent support behaviors.

Developed in 2002, NEWS assesses residents' perception of neighborhood design features related to physical activity, including residential density, land use mix (including both indices of proximity and accessibility), street connectivity, infrastructure for walking/cycling, neighborhood aesthetics, traffic and crime safety, and neighborhood satisfaction. NEWS has been validated in several countries. Multiple versions have been developed. We recommend use of the NEWS-CFA version.

The Neighborhood Quality of Life Study (NQLS), conducted between 2001-2005, was designed to identify environmental correlates of physical activity. This observational study of 2,200 adults aged 20-65 randomly selected from 32 neighborhoods in two regions of the U.S. developed new paradigms and measures for studying built environment associations with health behaviors. 

The Neighborhood Quality of Life Study for Seniors (SNQLS), conducted between 2005-2008, was designed to identify environmental correlates of physical activity for older adults (aged 66 and older). This observational study of 883 older adults randomly selected from 228 block groups and 15 assisted living facilities was conducted in two regions of the U.S.

Developed for the Child and Adolescent Trial for Cardiovascular Health (CATCH), these surveys collect information from students about their physical activities and selected sedentary activities occuring during the previous school day. PACI is administered through an interviewer, and SAPAC provides a parallel version for self-administration. These tools were based on extensive pre-testing and tested for reliability and validity. 

The International Physical Activity Prevalence Study (IPS) developed an optional environmental module that can be used to assess the environmental factors for walking and bicycling in your neighborhoods. PANES is a short-form environment measure that uses single items instead of multi-item scales. Revised in 2002, it is for use in the IPS Study in addition to the IPAQ (short form).

The objective of this set of studies, conducted from 2001 to 2005, was to develop reliable and valid physical activity, sedentary behavior, and diet screening measure for use with adolescents in primary care settings. Psychosocial measures also were developed and evaluated, consistent with social cognitive theory and the transtheoretical basis. These are brief measures, suitable for use in multi-behavior studies.

These measures were developed for the PACE+ studies of overweight and obese women and men. They were adapted from other measures and designed to be brief. They are based on social cognitive theory and the transtheoretical model, so they assess a variety of potential mediators. Reliability was evaluated among university students, and validity was assessed in the clinical studies. 

The purpose of Project GRAD (Graduate Ready for Activity Daily) was to evaluate a generalizable intervention to promote adoption and maintenance of physical activity among young adults transitioning from university to adult roles. The study, which was conducted from 1993 to 1997, improved on previous research by assessing longer-term outcomes of both physical activity and theoretically derived mediators, and the relation between the two. The survey assessed physical activity and numerous theory-based psychosocial and environmental mediators.

Project conducted from 1990-1993, assessing tobacco refusal skills in Latino youth.

A telephone and mail-based intervention started in 1998 to promote walking in sedentary ethnic minority women.

This survey was developed to assess managers of park and recreation centers about their interest in improving their physical activity programs. 

The purpose of SAFE was to evaluate a trans-disciplinary conceptual model of the relation of crime and crime-related perceptions to PA and other CVD-related outcomes across the life span. This required development of reliable measures of crime-related constructs that were applicable across the life span. The formative research phase involved systematic development of a set of measures, using age-specific focus groups, to assess perceptions of and responses to crime for 4 age groups from adolescents to older adults. Construct validity will be assessed by associations of each scale with objectively measured PA (accelerometers) and self-reported activity in specific domains (leisure, transport) and settings (indoors, neighborhood, parks).

This study was funded by CDC to evaluate a broad range of physical activity correlates. This was one of the first studies to be based on an ecological model of physical activity. Many scales in the survey were developed for this study.

This survey was developed to assess a variety of potential correlates of physical activity among high school students. Part of the San Diego Health and Exercise Project.

This questionnaire has been incorporated into several larger surveys, in various versions. The original version described in the Rosenberg et al (2010) paper was evaluated as part of the PACE Adult study. The Rosenberg (2010) paper has scoring instructions, but we have scored the measure in multiple ways, depending on the study purpose. Different versions of the SBQ have been used across several studies.

Self-efficacy is confidence in the ability to do specific behaviors in specific situations. These measures were developed to assess self-efficacy of adults for diet (fat, salt) and exercise. Items were developed through formative research. These scales have been adapted for "physical activity" (see GRAD survey) and very short versions (see San Diego Health and Exercise Project and NQLS).

[Jim to add text]

Implemented in 1986, the purpose of this study was to develop measures of perceived social support specific to health-related eating and exercise behaviors. These measures have been used in abbreviated versions. The physical activity measures were identified in GRAD to refer to "Physical Activity", and they were used in NQLS as 3-item scales.

SPARK is a research-based, public health organization dedicated to creating, implementing, and evaluating programs that promote lifelong wellness. SPARK strives to improve the health of children, adolescents, and adults by disseminating evidence-based Physical Education, After School, Early Childhood, and Coordinated School Health programs to teachers and recreation leaders serving Pre-K through 12th grade students. http://www.sparkpe.org/

The SPARK surveys were used in the original NHLBI-funded study, 1989-1995. The survey covers physical activity and psychosocial mediators.

Adolescents have lower levels of physical activity (PA) and more rapid weight gain during summertime when they are not attending school, and there is evidence of widening race/ethinc disparities during the summer. To better understand how to counter these trends, this study aimed to learn more about ethnic/racial differences in summertime PA and related barriers to inform possible solutions tailored to subgroups. The primary aim of this study is to compare PA patterns (timing, intensities, and amounts) and the places where PA occurs among middle school adolecsents. Barriers, opportunities, and prefrences also were compared. Comparisons were made across three dimensions: summertime versus school year, race/ethnicity subgroups, and boys versus girls. This study was UCSD's contribution to the Physical Activity Research Center, funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

[Jim to add text]

Published in 2009, the purpose of this instrument is to obtain simultaneous objective data on student activity levels, the lesson context in which they occur, and how teachers interact regarding promoting physical activity and fitness during physical education, exercise classes, and sport practices.

Published in 2002, SOPLAY was designed to obtain observational data on the number of students and their physical activity levels during play and leisure opportunities in a specific activity area. SOPLAY is based on momentary time sampling techniques in which systematic and periodic scans of individuals and contextual factors within pre-determined target areas are made. During a scan the activity of each individual is mechanically or electronically coded as Sedentary (lying down, sitting, or standing), Walking, or Very Active.

Funded by an NIH-NHLBI Grant from 2007-2011, this study was conducted in the Baltimore and Seattle regions with teenagers andseeks to better understand how where people live influences their health-related behaviors. Many of the survey scales were drawn from ActiveWhere? and PACE Adolescent studies.