Perfil da prática de atividade física em crianças e adolescentes de diferentes estados nutricionais

Abstract

Objective: The objective of this study is to describe the profile of physical activity among children and adolescents of different nutritional status. Method: The research is transversal, descriptive and has a quantitative approach. Thirty children and adolescents, aged 7 to 14 years (10.0 ± 2.1 years), participated in this research. They are students at the Sunday School of the Congregational Church in Bessa. The investigated variables were the practice of physical activity through a questionnaire structured by the researchers and the nutritional status through the body mass index (BMI) through measurements of body mass and height. The data were analysed through descriptive statistical analysis of the median, minimum, maximum, standard deviation, frequency distribution and student t test for independent groups. The data analysis was performed using SPSS 20.0. Results: There were no statistical differences between genders in body mass (p = 0.36), height (p = 0.21) and BMI (p = 0.76). The main observations on nutritional status were the presence of underweight in girls (11.8%) and overweight in high percentages both in boys (46.2%) and in girls (47.1%). Regarding the level of perceived physical activity, the boys showed higher frequencies in the categories very active (76.9%) and active (15.4%); and girls were less physically active (41.2%), with 35.3% not very active and 5.9% inactive. In the analysis of nutritional status and level of physical activity, there was no difference between eutrophic and overweight; in leisure-time physical activity, 71.4% of overweight children and adolescents were active if compared to 64.3% of the eutrophic ones, who also showed a greater sedentary behaviour (85.7%) when compared to those classified as overweight (71.4%). Conclusion: Children and adolescents of both sexes showed an imbalance in the weight status, especially when observed the high frequencies of overweight, obesity and in a lesser degree of nutritional deficit. With regard to the level of perceived physical activity, boys are more active and, in the analysis according to nutritional status, it was observed that those affected by excess weight were classified as more physically active and with less sedentary behaviour when compared to their eutrophic peers.