Clustering and Correlates of Multiple Health Behaviours in 9–10 Year Old Children

Background: Sleep, physical activity, screen time and dietary behaviours influence health during childhood, but few studies have looked at all of these behaviours simultaneously and previous research has relied predominantly on self- or proxy-reports of physical activity and food frequency questionnaires for the assessment of diet. Purpose: To assess the prevalence and clustering of health behaviours and examine the socio-demographic characteristics of children that fail to meet multiple health behaviour guidelines. Methods: Data are from the Sport, Physical activity and Eating behaviour: Environmental Determinants in Young people (SPEEDY) study. Participants (n = 1472, 42.9% male) were dichotomized based on whether or not they met public health guidelines for accelerometer-assessed physical activity, diet-diary assessed fruit/vegetable intake and fat/non-milk extrinsic sugar (NMES) intake, and self-reported screen time and sleep duration. Behavioural clustering was assessed using an observed over expected ratio (O/E). Socio-demographic characteristics of participants that failed to meet multiple health behaviour guidelines were examined using ordinal logistic regression. Data were analysed in 2013. Results: 83.3% of children failed to meet guidelines for two or more health behaviours. The O/E ratio for two behavioural combinations significantly exceeded 1, both of which featured high screen time, insufficient fruit/vegetable consumption and excessive fat/NMES intake. Children who were older (Proportional odds ratio (95% confidence interval): 1.69 (1.21,2.37)) and those that attended a school with a physical activity or diet-related policy (1.28 (1.01,1.62)) were more likely to have a poor health behaviour profile. Girls (0.80 (0.64,0.99)), participants with siblings (0.76 (0.61,0.94)) and those with more highly educated parents (0.73 (0.56,0.94)) were less likely to have a poor health behaviour profile. Conclusions: A substantial proportion of children failed to meet guidelines for multiple health behaviours and there was evidence of clustering of screen viewing and unhealthy dietary behaviours. Sub-groups at greatest risk may be targeted for intervention