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PHYSICAL ACTIVITY IN REMOTE AREAS

Definition

Questions encompassed the concepts of sports, exercise and physical activity, as well as walking to places, that were done in the morning, after lunch or at night on the day prior to interview.

The current National Physical Activity Guidelines for Australian adults (18 years and over), recommend that adults do at least 150 minutes of moderate to vigorous intensity physical activity over a week. This has also been represented as 30 minutes of moderate to vigorous intensity physical activity on 5 or more days per week. According to Active Australia methodology (that was generally applied to non-remote area data), calculations against this recommendation are focused on leisure time activities, and exclude activities while at work and also gardening, and household chores.

The current National Physical Activity Recommendations for 5-12 year olds and the National Physical Activity Recommendations for 13-17 year olds recommend at least 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity every day.

For details on physical activity in non-remote areas, see the Physical activity in non-remote areas chapter of this Users’ Guide.

Population

Information was collected for persons aged 5 years and over in remote areas in the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Survey (NATSIHS) and the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Nutrition Physical Activity Survey (NATSINPAS).

Methodology

Respondents were asked a prompted activity question about the sports, exercise or physical activity they undertook on the day prior to the interview. This was followed by a question on what places they walked to on the day prior to interview.

Whether sports, exercise or physical activity was undertaken the day prior to the interview for at least 30 minutes (adults)

After responding to questions on the types of sports, exercise or physical activity they had done or places to which they had walked on the day prior to interview, respondents aged 18 years and over, who were considered to have done physical activity on the day prior to interview, were asked for how long they spent doing all the applicable activities. Interviewers then coded to them categories of more or less than 30 minutes. This question was asked in order to give an indication of whether respondents achieved the recommended amount of physical activity on the day prior to the interview.

Consistent with Active Australia methodology, respondents who only reported doing the Housework/ Gardening/ Heavy yardwork category were considered to have done no physical activity when measuring against the 30 minutes in a day recommendation. In addition, respondents who reported this category with other types of activity were not prompted to include this category when asking about length of time spent doing all activities.

While the data from this question can provide a general assessment on meeting a recommendation on the day prior to interview, as an intensity level was not part of the question, caution should be taken when using this data.

Whether sports, exercise or physical activity was undertaken the day prior to the interview for at least 60 minutes (children 5-17 years old)

After responding to questions on the types of sports, exercise or physical activity they had done or places to which they had walked on the day prior to interview, respondents aged 5-17 years were asked for how long they spent doing all the activities. Interviewers then coded to them categories of more or less than 30 minutes. This question was asked in order to give an indication of whether respondents achieved the recommended amount of physical activity the day prior to the interview.

While the data from this question can provide a general assessment on meeting a recommendation on the day prior to interview, as an intensity level was not part of the question, caution should be taken when using this data.

Whether time spent was usual

After providing details on the time spent (for those that were asked), respondents were asked whether they usually do the same, more or less exercise than they did yesterday.

Respondents who did not do any physical activity (or adults who only reported Housework/ Gardening/ Heavy yardwork) were not asked whether they usually do more or less physical activity and therefore no assessment can be made regarding their usual pattern of activity.

Primary behaviour

After answering a sedentary behaviour question, respondents were asked which of the following best described what they mostly did on the day prior to the interview:

• mostly sitting
• mostly standing
• mostly walking
• mostly heavy labour or physically demanding work.

Day of reported physical activity	Number of AATSIHS child respondents n=1489	Number of AATSIHS adult respondents n=3608
Monday	273	665
Tuesday	308	714
Wednesday	242	622
Thursday	199	495
Friday	142	291
Saturday	85	212
Sunday	240	609

• Although extensive pick lists were provided from which respondents could choose, many respondents provided answers in the ‘other’ category when asked what types of sports, exercise or physical activity they undertook and what places they walked to the day prior to the interview. These activities are published as ‘other’ and therefore, some activities may be under-represented due to the high reporting in this broad category.
• Active Australia guidelines that measure against physical activity recommendations include sports, exercise or physical activity undertaken in leisure time only. As work was not specifically excluded from questions asking respondents to report their sports, exercise, physical activity and walking, it cannot be assumed that sports, exercise or physical activity undertaken at work were not reported when responding about activities or time spent on the activities.
• The questions were designed to give a general indication of types of sports, exercise and physical activity undertaken and a general indication of whether the time spent met recommended levels. However, as intensity level, number of sessions, the specific amount of time spent exercising on each day during the week (for children) or for the full week (for adults) prior to the interview, data cannot be accurately reported against the guidelines.
• In some cases respondent may have reported walking for transport as in the 'other' response category for the sports, exercise and physical activity question. In clear cases, for example where walking for transport was specified in the ‘other’ category, this was removed. However, there may still be some duplication of reporting.
• When coding the time responses that respondents provided, interviewers were given the option of reporting whether they undertook more or less than 60 minutes (children aged 5 to 17 years) or 30 minutes (adults 18 years and over) of sports, exercise or physical activity the day prior to the interview. It is assumed that respondents who did 60 or 30 minutes of exercise reported this in the upper category of more than 60 minutes or more than 30 minutes of sports, exercise and physical activity however this may not be the case.
• The questions regarding whether the time spent was the same, more or less are a general guide only. Conclusions on whether the respondent might usually meet the recommended level of activity are not considered appropriate in all cases due to respondents not being prompted for the threshold in the question wording (they are asked how long they did the activities and the interviewer codes them to a category) and therefore some respondents may be thinking about numbers well above or well below the threshold levels and then respond to the usual questions with reference to these unrecorded numbers. Respondents who identified they were above the threshold and say they usually do the same or more could be assessed to generally meet the recommended level. However respondents who identified they were above but usually do less cannot be assessed against the recommendation as this response does not indicate whether what they usually do would still keep them above the threshold or would drop them below. A similar situation occurs with those who identified they were below the threshold in that those who say they usually do the same or less could be assessed to generally not meet the recommended level. However respondents who identified that they usually do more cannot be assessed against the recommendation as this response does not indicate whether what they usually do would still keep them below the threshold or would move them above. As a result, data should be treated with caution.
• Respondents who did not do any physical activity were not asked whether they usually do more or less physical activity and therefore no assessment can be made regarding their usual pattern of activity.
• When pick lists are offered to respondents, some bias may occur as respondents can be more likely to respond to options on the list. Pick lists were offered for questions relating to what physical activities were undertaken and to what places respondents walked.
• There has been an increasing emphasis on the importance of physical activity for adults and children in recent years. This may have introduced bias with the reporting of socially desirable responses in some instances.
• Due to the reporting of days not having an even spread of respondents, day of week analysis and weekend/weekday analysis is not recommended or should be done with caution.

• For adults in non-remote areas, the reference period is one week, compared with one day in remote areas.
• In non-remote areas, walking for transport or fitness, recreation or sport, required the activity to have lasted for at least 10 minutes. In remote areas, no time requirement was specified.
• In remote areas, there was no reference to an intensity level for the activities reported. For adults and children in non-remote areas, moderate and vigorous intensity levels was specified for non-walking activities.
• For children, time spent per day on physical activity or active transport was calculated in non-remote areas by adding time across the categories (which had an allocated MET score of 3 or more) reported. In remote areas a single question was asked with regard to how much time respondents spent on physical activities (with response categories of more or less than 60 minutes) with no intensity requirement.
• The remote question had prompted response categories, whereas in non-remote areas responses relied on recall alone. Therefore, there may be increased reporting of specific activities that were prompted in remote areas.