Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2024 Feb 20;19(2):e0297102.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0297102. eCollection 2024.

Accelerometer-measured 24-hour movement behaviours over 7 days in Malaysian children and adolescents: A cross-sectional study

Sophia M Brady  1 , Ruth Salway  1   2 , Jeevitha Mariapun  3 , Louise Millard  2 , Amutha Ramadas  4 , Hussein Rizal  4 , Andy Skinner  2 , Chris Stone  5 , Laura Johnson  1   2 , Tin Tin Su  4   6 , Miranda E G Armstrong  1
Affiliations

Accelerometer-measured 24-hour movement behaviours over 7 days in Malaysian children and adolescents: A cross-sectional study

Sophia M Brady et al. PLoS One. .

Abstract

Background: Quantifying movement behaviours over 24-hours enables the combined effects of and inter-relations between sleep, sedentary time and physical activity (PA) to be understood. This is the first study describing 24-hour movement behaviours in school-aged children and adolescents in South-East Asia. Further aims were to investigate between-participant differences in movement behaviours by demographic characteristics and timing of data collection during Ramadan and COVID-19 restrictions.

Methods: Data came from the South-East Asia Community Observatory health surveillance cohort, 2021-2022. Children aged 7-18 years within selected households in Segamat, Malaysia wore an Axivity AX6 accelerometer on their wrist for 24 hours/day over 7 days, completed the PAQ-C questionnaire, and demographic information was obtained. Accelerometer data was processed using GGIR to determine time spent asleep, inactive, in light-intensity PA (LPA) and moderate-to-vigorous PA (MVPA). Differences in accelerometer-measured PA by demographic characteristics (sex, age, ethnicity, socioeconomic group) were explored using univariate linear regression. Differences between data collected during vs outside Ramadan or during vs after COVID-19 restrictions, were investigated through univariate and multiple linear regressions, adjusted for age, sex and ethnicity.

Results: The 491 participants providing accelerometer data spent 8.2 (95% confidence interval (CI) = 7.9-8.4) hours/day asleep, 12.4 (95% CI = 12.2-12.7) hours/day inactive, 2.8 (95% CI = 2.7-2.9) hours/day in LPA, and 33.0 (95% CI = 31.0-35.1) minutes/day in MVPA. Greater PA and less time inactive were observed in boys vs girls, children vs adolescents, Indian and Chinese vs Malay children and higher income vs lower income households. Data collection during Ramadan or during COVID-19 restrictions were not associated with MVPA engagement after adjustment for demographic characteristics.

Conclusions: Demographic characteristics remained the strongest correlates of accelerometer-measured 24-hour movement behaviours in Malaysian children and adolescents. Future studies should seek to understand why predominantly girls, adolescents and children from Malay ethnicities have particularly low movement behaviours within Malaysia.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Figures

Fig 1
Fig 1. Timeline of data collection including external events.
Fig 2
Fig 2. Study flowchart.
Fig 3
Fig 3. Proportions of time (% of day) spent in different movement behaviours by demographic characteristic group.
Fig 4
Fig 4. Univariate linear regression results of differences in MVPA engagement from reference category.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

References

    1. Parfitt G, Eston RG. The relationship between children’s habitual activity level and psychological well‐being. Acta Paediatrica. 2005;94(12):1791–7. doi: 10.1111/j.1651-2227.2005.tb01855.x - DOI - PubMed
    1. Ness AR, Leary SD, Mattocks C, Blair SN, Reilly JJ, Wells JCK, et al.. Objectively measured physical activity and fat mass in a large cohort of children. PLoS medicine. 2007;4(3):e97. doi: 10.1371/journal.pmed.0040097 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Andersen LB, Harro M, Sardinha LB, Froberg K, Ekelund U, Brage S, et al.. Physical activity and clustered cardiovascular risk in children: a cross-sectional study (The European Youth Heart Study). The Lancet. 2006;368(9532):299–304. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(06)69075-2 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Verloigne M, Van Lippevelde W, Maes L, Yıldırım M, Chinapaw M, Manios Y, et al.. Levels of physical activity and sedentary time among 10- to 12-year-old boys and girls across 5 European countries using accelerometers: an observational study within the ENERGY-project. International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity. 2012;9(1):34. doi: 10.1186/1479-5868-9-34 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Ekelund U, Sardinha LB, Anderssen SA, Harro M, Franks PW, Brage S, et al.. Associations between objectively assessed physical activity and indicators of body fatness in 9- to 10-y-old European children: a population-based study from 4 distinct regions in Europe (the European Youth Heart Study). Am J Clin Nutr. 2004;80(3):584–90. doi: 10.1093/ajcn/80.3.584 . - DOI - PubMed