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American Journal of Epidemiology Advance Access originally published online on September 18, 2009
American Journal of Epidemiology 2009 170(9):1069-1077; doi:10.1093/aje/kwp271
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American Journal of Epidemiology © The Author 2009. Published by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org.

ORIGINAL CONTRIBUTIONS

Socioeconomic Position and the Tracking of Physical Activity and Cardiorespiratory Fitness From Childhood to Adulthood

Verity J. Cleland, Kylie Ball, Costan Magnussen, Terence Dwyer and Alison Venn

Correspondence to Dr. Verity J. Cleland, Centre for Physical Activity and Nutrition Research, Deakin University, 221 Burwood Highway, Burwood, Victoria, 3125 Australia (e-mail: verity.cleland{at}deakin.edu.au).

Received for publication March 4, 2009. Accepted for publication June 11, 2009.

This study examined the influence of childhood socioeconomic position (SEP) and social mobility on activity and fitness tracking from childhood into adulthood. In a prospective cohort of 2,185 Australian adults (aged 26–36 years), first examined in 1985 (at ages 7–15 years), self-reported physical activity and cardiorespiratory fitness (subsample only) were measured. SEP measures included retrospectively reported parental education (baseline) and own education (follow-up). There was little evidence of a relation between childhood SEP and activity tracking, but high childhood SEP (maternal education) was associated with a 59% increased likelihood of persistent fitness, and medium childhood SEP (paternal and parental education) was associated with a 33%–36% decreased likelihood of persistent fitness. Upward social mobility was associated with a greater likelihood of increasing activity (38%–49%) and fitness (90%), and persistently high SEP was associated with a greater likelihood of increasing activity (males: 58%) and fitness (males and females combined: 89%). In conclusion, persistently high SEP and upward social mobility were associated with increases in activity and fitness from childhood to adulthood. Findings highlight socioeconomic differentials in activity and fitness patterns and suggest that improvements in education may represent a pathway through which physical activity levels can be increased and health benefits achieved.

adult; child; motor activity; physical fitness; prospective studies; social class; social mobility

Abbreviations: SEP, socioeconomic position

Editor's note: An invited commentary on this article appears on page 1078, and the authors’ response is published on page 1082.


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Related articles in Am. J. Epidemiol.:

Cleland et al. Respond to "Physical Activity Over the Life Course"
Verity J. Cleland, Kylie Ball, Costan Magnussen, Terence Dwyer, and Alison Venn
Am. J. Epidemiol. 2009 170: 1082-1083. [Extract] [Full Text]  



This article has been cited by other articles:


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V. J. Cleland, K. Ball, C. Magnussen, T. Dwyer, and A. Venn
Cleland et al. Respond to "Physical Activity Over the Life Course"
Am. J. Epidemiol., November 1, 2009; 170(9): 1082 - 1083.
[Full Text] [PDF]


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