title: Travel by walking before and after school and physical activity among adolescent girls.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To examine how "travel by walking" before and after school contributes to total physical activity of adolescent girls.
  
  
  METHODS
  Cross-sectional sample.
  
  
  METHODS
  Thirty-six middle schools from Arizona, Maryland, Minnesota, Louisiana, California, and South Carolina participating in the Trial of Activity for Adolescent Girls (TAAG).
  
  
  METHODS
  Seventeen hundred twenty-one sixth-grade girls consented to participate; adequate information was available for 1596 participants (93%).
  
  
  METHODS
  Travel by walking before school, after school, and before and after school combined assessed from the 3-Day Physical Activity Recall.
  
  
  METHODS
  Mean minutes of physical activity measured by accelerometry were estimated for total physical activity (light, moderate, vigorous), moderate to vigorous activity (MVPA), and MVPA of 3 metabolic equivalents.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Travel by walking was reported by 14% of participants before school and 18% after school. Girls who reported travel by walking before and after school (combined) had 13.7 more minutes (95% confidence interval, 1.2-26.3) of total physical activity and 4.7 more minutes (95% confidence interval, 2.2-7.2) of MVPA than girls who did not report this activity. Before-school and after-school walkers (but not both) accumulated 2.5 more minutes (95% confidence interval, 0.10-4.9) and 2.2 more minutes (95% confidence interval, 0.24-4.2) of MVPA on an average weekday, respectively, than nonwalkers.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our results provide evidence that walking to and from school increases weekday minutes of total physical activity and MVPA for middle-school girls.
authors.affiliation: Department of Kinesiology, University of Maryland, College Park 20742, USA. bsaksvig@umd.edu
authors.forename: Brit I
authors.initials: BI
authors.lastname: Saksvig
authors.forename: Diane J
authors.initials: DJ
authors.lastname: Catellier
authors.forename: Karin
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Pfeiffer
authors.forename: Kathryn H
authors.initials: KH
authors.lastname: Schmitz
authors.forename: Terry
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Conway
authors.forename: Scott
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Going
authors.forename: Dianne
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Ward
authors.forename: Patty
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Strikmiller
authors.forename: Margarita S
authors.initials: MS
authors.lastname: Treuth
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000294:Adolescent Behavior; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001130:Arizona / Q000453:epidemiology; D002140:California / Q000453:epidemiology; D016001:Confidence Intervals; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D015444:Exercise; D005260:Female; D015438:Health Behavior; D006293:Health Promotion / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D008019:Life Style; D008145:Louisiana / Q000453:epidemiology; D008396:Maryland / Q000453:epidemiology; D008910:Minnesota / Q000453:epidemiology; D009765:Obesity / Q000517:prevention & control; D010809:Physical Fitness; D013022:South Carolina / Q000453:epidemiology; D016138:Walking / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D016387:Women's Health