title: Pedometer determined physical activity and obesity prevalence of Greek children aged 4-6 years.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Pre-school age is important for developing healthy attitudes towards physical activity (PA). However, research on pre-schoolers' pedometer-determined PA is limited.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To describe pre-schoolers' ambulatory activity; investigate step count differences in respect to Body Mass Index (BMI) categories and examine the prevalence of obesity.
  
  
  METHODS
  Pre-school aged children (n = 250; 5.5 ± 0.4 years) from Komotini (Greece) wore Omron HJ-720IT-E2 pedometers for 10 consecutive days. Height and weight were measured and BMI was calculated.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Three-way repeated measures ANOVAs revealed that children performed more steps on weekdays than during weekends (p < 0.001) and during leisure time than school (p < 0.001). Significant differences appeared between normal and obese children's counts on weekdays (p < 0.001), weekend days (p < 0.05), during school (p < 0.001), after school (p < 0.005) and in weekly steps (p < 0.005). No gender differences were detected. Moreover, according to a sample t-test analysis, children's daily steps were significantly different from the 10,000 steps/day guideline, while obesity prevalence was 15.6%.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  School-based ambulatory activity is lower than after school ambulatory activity, independent of BMI-category and gender, although obese children demonstrated fewer steps. Taking into account the high rate of both the obesity prevalence and children not meeting the 10,000 steps/day guideline, the need for preventive policies becomes obvious.
authors.affiliation: School of Physical Education and Sport Science, Democritus University of Thrace , Komotini , Greece and.
authors.forename: Antonis
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Kambas
authors.forename: Fotini
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Venetsanou
authors.forename: Alexandra
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Avloniti
authors.forename: Dimitra M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Giannakidou
authors.forename: Vassilios
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Gourgoulis
authors.forename: Dimitrios
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Draganidis
authors.forename: Athanasios
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Chatzinikolaou
authors.forename: Ioannis
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Fatouros
authors.forename: Maria
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Michalopoulou
mesh_terms: D061725:Accelerometry; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006115:Greece / Q000453:epidemiology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009043:Motor Activity; D009765:Obesity / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000209:etiology; D015995:Prevalence
keywords: Leisure-time; Omron HJ-720IT-E2; obesity; preschoolers; school-time