Keeping Kids Active Now Pays off Later

In a study that has just been published in the British Medical Journal, the authors, who asked 7159 12-year-old children to wear accelerometers for a full week and then come back to the lab at age 14 and have their body fat mass directly measured using Dual Energy X-Ray Absorptiometry, found that the more physically active the kids were at age 12, the lower their fat mass was at age 14. Surprisingly, these results were independent of the children’s fat mass at age 12. So, no matter how much fat a child had at age 12, if he or she was more active, the less fat mass he or she had at age 14. Author Chris Riddoch and colleagues also estimated that 12 year old children "who meet current health related recommendations of 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity a day would be expected to have around 4.3 kg less fat mass at age 14 than children who do not meet those recommendations.

So why do I care to mention this study today on our exergames blog? In their results, the authors specifically mention that an increase of 15 minutes a day of moderate to vigorous physical activity at age 12 is associated with around 10% lower fat mass in girls and a 12% lower fat mass in boys at age 14. This percentage difference is equivalent to a reduced fat mass of about 1 kg. That is the equivalent of 2.2 pounds and I am sure it is the same at any age, not just 12 to 14. So we need to get our kids moving and up off the couch, replacing the passive video games with active games. Adding 15 minutes of activity everyday is easy and with exergames it can be fun.
The study is available free online on the BML website.