Do Children Engaged in Organized Sports Meet the Recommended Levels of Step Counts?

Abstract

This study aimed to calculate the step counts of children who regularly participate in organized sports within specific time periods (weekday, weekend, school time, out-of-school, sports days, days without sports) and to determine whether they reach the recommended activity level. Forty-one boys and 39 girls (11.97±.84 yrs. for all participants) participated in this study voluntarily. Step counts were determined by using ActiGraph wGT3x-BT. It was worn on their dominant wrist for seven days. An Independent Samples t-test was used to examine the difference between the genders. A Paired-Samples t-Test was used to compare the step counts of specific periods in both girls and boys. There were significant differences in step counts between boys and girls in terms of the whole week, weekdays, school time, Saturdays, sports days, and non-sports days, and boys reached more step counts than girls (p<0.05). No significant difference was found between school time and out of school time for boys. Weekly average, 56.4% of girls and 51.2% of boys meet the recommended number of steps. The number of steps taken by both girls and boys during the sport days was more than non-sport days (p <0,05). Moreover, girls and boys on weekdays took more the number of steps than on a weekend (p <0,05). In conclusion, boys reached more number of steps than girls in terms of the weekly average, weekdays, school time, Saturday, sports days, and non-sports days. The period in which the rate of reaching the recommended step counts for girls was highest (84.6%) on sports days. Both girls and boys had higher step counts on weekdays than on the weekends. The number of steps for both girls and boys on sports days was more than non-sport days.