[Habitual physical activity during growth]

Abstract

The three objectives of the present review of the literature were to: characterize the evolution of habitual physical activity (HPA) during growth; evaluate the tracking of HPA from childhood to adulthood; and analyse the level of HPA in children and adolescents according to public health recommendations. Data indicates that HPA decreases from childhood to adulthood about 7% per year, with a great reduction during puberty and adolescence concurrent to changes in the type of physical activity. It appears that HPA is not quite steady (0.09 < r < 0.66) during growth, which means that behavioural changes occur. Being very active during childhood or adolescence does not necessarily translate into a high level of HPA in adulthood. The mean values of HPA of children and adolescents vary from 15 to 90 min.day(-1) between studies, and for most of them HPA has been higher or close to public health recommendations. However, these results mask a great number of children and adolescents who are inactive or becoming inactive (40 to 45% of the population).