Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
Recent systematic reviews by
Park and Kim (2008)
and
Craggs, Corder,
van Sluijs, and Griffin (2011)
also revealed that psychosocial variables were
positive significant predictive factors in most of the studies. However, the
determinants of PA in these studies also included sex, ethnicity, socioeco-
nomic status, and environmental factors (
Kahn et al., 2008; Krange &
Bjerke, 2011; Park & Kim, 2008
); and therefore, findings generated from
one population may not be applicable to the others, even if they are living
in the same region of the world. Hence, we suggest that more large-scale
studies using a multivariate approach should be conducted in tropical coun-
tries, particularly in those countries with high levels of physical inactivity, to
further establish evidence for the development of effective PA promotion
programs among children and adolescents.
One of the identified issues related to PA that would require serious con-
sideration is the selection of an appropriate technique or method for assessing
PA to avoid under- or overestimation, particularly in the young population.
In this context, we found that most of the surveys or studies conducted in
tropical countries only used subjective methods of PA assessment, such as a
PA questionnaire, to determine the PA levels of the children and adoles-
cents. Caution should be taken when interpreting these data, as this method
greatly relies on the subject's memory and self-perception of PA behavior
Furthermore, an international consensus on PA guidelines or recom-
mendations should be established. Currently, different guidelines have been
developed and used by different countries to define the PA levels of children
and adolescents, which has caused some difficulties in making comparisons
across the countries and has hindered the establishment of global prevalence
data. Therefore, we suggest a greater collaboration among researchers
toward the standardization of surveillance methods and guidelines are
needed to further ensure the quality of the studies conducted to assess PA
in children and adolescents in the tropics.
4. PHYSICAL FITNESS IN THE TROPICS
4.1. Physical fitness
PF can be defined as “a physiologic state of well-being that allows one to
meet the demands of daily living or that provides the basis for sport perfor-
mance, or both” (
Warburton, Nicol, & Bredin, 2006
)
. There are two cat-
egories of PF, namely, performance-related fitness and health-related fitness
(
Howley, 2001
)
. The former refers to attributes that relate to an individual's
