Awareness of Canada's Physical Activity Guide to Healthy Active Living in a Large Community Sample

Abstract

Purpose.

Determine the proportion of adults aware of Canada's Physical Activity Guide to Healthy Active Living (Guide) and its specific recommendations (objective 1); whether key demographic factors (objective 2a) and physical activity behavior (objective 2b) are associated with awareness and specific familiarity with the Guide; and if changes in awareness and specific recommendations with the Guide occurred over a 1-year period (objective 3a and 3b).

Design.

Random selection with computer-assisted telephone interviewing.

Setting.

Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.

Subjects.

A total of 2803 adults 18 years or older completed interviews from 4831 telephone contacts (response rate, 58.0%), and after 1 year, 1423 individuals (55%) completed interviews.

Measures.

Demographic, physical activity, Guide awareness.

Analysis.

Chi-square, analysis of variance.

Results.

At baseline, 27.3% were aware of the Guide, and 15.6% were familiar with the Guide's specific recommendations. Younger individuals (p = .01), women (p < .001), and those with a higher education (p < .001) were more likely to be generally aware of the Guide, and women were also more specifically aware (p = .01). Physical activity levels were positively associated with the general (p < .001) and specific (p < .001) awareness of the Guide. Changes in general familiarity and specific recommendations over 1 year were observed.

Conclusions.

The majority of those surveyed were not familiar with the Guide. Men, individuals with a lower education, and older individuals may need to be specifically targeted. (Am J Health Promot 2011;25[5]:294-297.)

Keywords

Public Health Guidelines Physical Activity Awareness Prevention Research Manuscript format: research Research purpose: estimate awareness of public health guidelines Study design: randomized population based prospective Outcome measure: awareness behavior Setting: large urban center Health focus: physical activity Strategy: computer-assisted telephone interviewing Target population age: adults Target population circumstances: geographic location Other: alberta Canada Canadians

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