| Background:Rapid urbanization and fast economic development since 1978 transformed Chinese cities and the lifestyle of Chinese residents,as a result,school age children gradually formed a "sedentary" lifestyle.Physical activity of school age children in China is decreasing while the prevalence of overweight/obesity and poor eyesight is increasing in the recent years.Meanwhile,children travel to and from school is overlapping with the morning and afternoon traffic peak hours of a city,therefore school-age children's commuting to and from school further add to the traffic volume around school.Encouraging children walking and cycling to and from school can increase their physical activity level,decrease prevalence of overweight and obesity,and levitate the traffic congestion around schools.The objectives of this study are two folds,1)at school level,exploring the characteristics of travel mode to and from school and its influencing factors;2)at individual level,exploring correlates of active commuting to school.Methods:We selected 32 public elementary schools located in 16 urban districts in Shanghai using stratified sampling.The data are collected as follow:behavior observation method was implemented to tally student travel modes to and from school,CLASS-C survey was used to collect relevant information at individual level,and Baidu API was employed to objectively measure the built environment attributes around the school and school age children's home.Descriptive statistics,one-way ANOVA,chi square test,simple linear regression analysis,principal component analysis and binary logistic regression analysis were performed using SPSS 23.0.Results:Three main findings of study one are identified.First,walking is still the leading travel mode going to and coming from school for school-age children in Shanghai,and following by electronic bike,another main travel mode.Secondly,at the school level,the proportion of travelling by car and electronic bike to school is higher than that of coming back from school;more boys walk alone to and from school,meanwhile more girls walk accompanied by adults to and from school;more than half of students from schools located in the center areas walk to and from school,but in suburban area,this proportion is much lower.Thirdly,built environmental measures such as transportation facilities,counts of different destinations,and residential building density were positively correlated with the rates of walking to school,but negatively correlated with the rates of inactive commuting to school.More school neighborhood built environmental attributes were identified to be associated with traveling to school than that of traveling from school.Three findings of study two are identified.First,43.1%of students walk or bike to school more than three times a week.Secondly,social interactions and social supports,such as physical activity level of parents,parents' understanding on the adequate amount of children participating in physical activity,family members or friends directly involved in school-age children's physical activity or sedentary behavior,and family members encouraging children to participate in physical activity,were found to have a strong influence on the frequency of walking or biking to school.Thirdly,the child's leisure physical activity,school enrollment,distance between school and home,and restaurant density in 200m buffer of home were significantly associated with the frequency of walking or biking to school.Conclusion:Walking is still the main travel mode school age children use to commute to and from school in Shanghai,but the percentage of school age children who walk to school more than 3 times a week is relatively low.As a result,the level of transportation related physical activity of school age children in Shanghai is still low.Among those factors that were identified to be correlated with the travel mode to and from school,school neighborhood environment attributes and social supports are the most important factors. |
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