An investigation into the minimum accelerometry wear time for reliable estimates of habitual physical activity and definition of a standard measurement day in pre-school children.

Hislop, Jane; Law, James; Rush, Robert; Grainger, Andrew; Bulley, Cathy; Reilly, John J; Mercer, Tom

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine the number of hours and days of accelerometry data necessary to provide a reliable estimate of habitual physical activity in pre-school children. The impact of a weekend day on reliability estimates was also determined and standard measurement days were defined for weekend and weekdays. Accelerometry data were collected from 112 children (60 males, 52 females, mean (SD) 3.7 (0.7)yr) over 7 d. The Spearman-Brown Prophecy formula (S-B prophecy formula) was used to predict the number of days and hours of data required to achieve an intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) of 0.7. The impact of including a weekend day was evaluated by comparing the reliability coefficient (r) for any 4 d of data with data for 4 d including one weekend day. Our observations indicate that 3 d of accelerometry monitoring, regardless of whether it includes a weekend day, for at least 7 h d-1 offers sufficient reliability to characterise total physical activity and sedentary behaviour of pre-school children. These findings offer an approach that addresses the underlying tension in epidemiologic surveillance studies between the need to maintain acceptable measurement rigour and retention of a representatively meaningful sample size.
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Citation

Hislop, J., Law, J., Rush, R., Grainger, A., Bulley, C., Reilly, J. J., & Mercer, T. (2014). An investigation into the minimum accelerometry wear time for reliable estimates of habitual physical activity and definition of a standard measurement day in pre-school children. Physiological Measurement, 35(11), 2213-2228. https://doi.org/10.1088/0967-3334/35/11/2213

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Jul 29, 2014
• Online Publication Date: Oct 23, 2014
• Publication Date: Dec 1, 2014
• Deposit Date: Dec 10, 2018
• Journal: Physiological Measurement
• Print ISSN: 0967-3334
• Electronic ISSN: 1361-6579
• Publisher: IOP Publishing
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 35
• Issue: 11
• Pages: 2213-2228
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1088/0967-3334/35/11/2213
• Keywords: accelerometry, measurement, physical activity, pre-school, reliability,
• Public URL: http://researchrepository.napier.ac.uk/Output/1245580