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The early years is a critical stage to establish optimal nutrition and movement behaviours. Community playgroups are a relaxed environment for parents with a focus on social connection and supporting parents in their role as 'First Teachers'. Playgroups are therefore an opportunistic setting to promote health behaviours in the early years.
Regular physical activity is important for children's physical and mental health, yet many children do not achieve recommended amounts of physical activity. Dog ownership has been associated with increased physical activity in children, however, there have been no longitudinal studies examining this relationship.
Having a walkable built environment is important to encourage active school transport. The aim of this study was to measure the walkability of all Perth, Western Australian schools and investigate whether differences in walkability exist by school type, socioeconomic status and/or subregion.
Outdoor play in the home yard is an important source of physical activity for many preschoolers. This study investigated if home yard size and vegetation are related to preschooler outdoor play time.
Dog ownership is a potential strategy for maintaining physical activity levels and supporting healthy aging. This study examined longitudinal effects of dog ownership and dog walking on physical activity and mental health in mid-to-older aged adults.
People living with severe mental illness have a reduced life expectancy when compared to the general population largely due to physical health comorbidities. Exercise is a valuable, evidence-based component of mental healthcare, with positive effects on physical health, mental health, and quality of life.
Despite the well-documented benefits of exercise for adolescents’ physical and mental health, exercise remains an underutilized strategy for improving the health of trans adolescents. This is notable because, compared to their cisgender peers, trans adolescents experience greater health challenges and systemic barriers to being physically active. To date, no research has evaluated an evidence-based exercise service within specialist paediatric gender services in Australia.
In this scoping review, we explore the concept of human thriving in work populations that are repeatedly exposed to high stress, elevated threat, and potential trauma-professions such as first responders and front-line military personnel. The concept of thriving, defined as the joint experience of development and success, shares some similarities with other psychological concepts (e.g., resilience, posttraumatic growth, flourishing), but is distinct due to the consideration of physical wellbeing, and success (e.g., performance).
Childcare services such as preschools and long day care centres have been identified as a key setting to promote physical activity in early childhood as they provide access to large numbers of children for prolonged periods. Yet, specific standards for the type and amount of physical activity children accumulate whilst attending childcare are lacking. The purpose of this study was to derive population-referenced percentile values for children's total movement and energetic play whilst attending early childhood education and care services.
Rates of mental illness are disproportionately high for young adult and higher education (e.g., university student) populations. As such, universities and tertiary institutions often devote significant efforts to services and programs that support and treat mental illness and/or mental distress. However, within that portfolio of treatment approaches, structured exercise has been relatively underutilised and greater research attention is needed to develop this evidence base.