Social inequalities in health-related use of time in Australian adolescents
Date
2012
Authors
Ferrar, K.E.
Olds, T.S.
Maher, C.A.
Gomersall, S.R.
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Journal article
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Australian and New Zealand Journal of Public Health, 2012; 36(4):378-384
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Abstract
Objective: Young people's socioeconomic position and time use behaviours – including physical activity, sedentary behaviours, social engagement, sleep and cognitive activities – have been associated with health outcomes. This study aimed to describe how time use varies with household income in a representative sample of 9–16 year old Australians.
Methods: A random sample of 2,071 9–16 year old Australian children provided household income data and four days’ use-of-time data. Average daily minutes spent in various types of activities were calculated. Kruskal-Wallis and Mann Whitney U tests were used to compare time use across the income bands.
Results: Higher income participants spent significantly more time playing sport (p<0.0001), including team sports (p=0.0005), and in cognitively demanding behaviours such as school routine (p<0.0001), doing homework (p<0.0001) and playing music (p=0.001) than their low-income counterparts. Conversely, low-income participants spent significantly more time watching television (p<0.001) and playing videogames (p<0.0002). There were no differences in sleep or social interaction. Screen time and school-related activities were the major locations of differences.
Conclusions: Time use differences in the areas of sport, school-related and screen activities may be associated with various health and wellbeing outcomes, and thus be a source of health inequalities.
Implications: Socioeconomic-related time use behaviour differences could be used to develop specific interventions to address health inequalities via interventions addressing time use or income inequalities.
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Copyright 2012 Ferrar, K., Olds, T., Maher, C., Gomersall, S. and Public Health Association of Australia