Parental Influences on Youth Physical Activity
Summary
Parents play a pivotal role in shaping children’s engagement in physical activity through multiple pathways. By modelling active lifestyles, providing logistical and emotional support, establishing household norms and co-participating in exercise, mothers and fathers can enhance youths’ motivation and access to activity. Parental attitudes towards movement, screen use and health behaviours create a family climate that either encourages or hinders children’s adoption of regular moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA). Socio-economic factors, cultural values and neighbourhood environments mediate these influences, with disparities evident across income levels and geographic regions. Interventions that target parental self-efficacy, promote family co-activity and reduce sedentary options have demonstrated improvements in children’s overall activity profiles. Embedding these insights within public health programmes and school-based initiatives offers a practical route to address physical inactivity and prevent related chronic health conditions globally.
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Parental Influences on Youth Physical Activity publication trend
The graph below shows the total number of articles in parental influences on youth physical activity across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).
Technical terms
Parental modelling: Demonstration of physical activity by parents, serving as an observational learning cue for children.
Moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA): Activity intensity that elevates heart rate substantially above resting levels, typically measured in minutes per day.
Sedentary behaviour: Waking activity characterised by low energy expenditure, such as sitting or reclining during screen time.
Self-efficacy: An individual’s belief in their capacity to organise and execute actions required to manage prospective situations, here applied to parental support of youth activity.
Accelerometry: Objective method for recording movement intensity and duration via wearable devices, commonly used to assess MVPA and sedentary patterns.
References
- Associations of parental attitudes and health behaviors with children’s screen time over four years. BMC Public Health (2023).
- Association between parent and child physical activity: a systematic review. International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity (2020).
- Development of a consensus statement on the role of the family in the physical activity, sedentary, and sleep behaviours of children and youth. International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity (2020).
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