Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2015 Jan:31:133-7.
doi: 10.1016/j.healthplace.2014.10.013. Epub 2014 Dec 18.

A longitudinal study of the distance that young people walk to school

P Chillón  1 , J Panter  2 , K Corder  3 , A P Jones  4 , E M F Van Sluijs  5
Affiliations

A longitudinal study of the distance that young people walk to school

P Chillón et al. Health Place. 2015 Jan.

Abstract

Walking or cycling to school has been associated with important health benefits. Distance between home and school is the main correlate of active commuting to school, but how far children walk to school and how this changes as children age is unknown. Mode of commuting and objectively-assessed distance to school were measured at 3 time points: aged 9/10 years, 10/11 years and 13/14 years. Data were analysed using ROC-curve analyses. With age, children walked further to school; the threshold distance that best discriminated walkers from passive commuters was 1421 m in 10-year-olds, 1627 m in 11-year-olds and 3046 m in 14-year-olds. Future interventions should consider the distance that young people actually walk.

Keywords: Adolescence; Children; Distance; Walking to school.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Percentage of walkers and passive commuters by distance from home to school (in percentiles) at 10 years (n=1826), at 11 years (distance home to school: all participants at 11 years except those 42 that moved from the measurement at 10 years; n=780) and at 14 years (n=372).
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
ROC curve analysis for walkers (negative) vs. passive (positive) commuters to school according to distance from home to school at 10 years (N=1825), at 11 years (N=788) and at 14 years (N=376). (a) ROC Curve at 10 years old (b) ROC Curve at 11 years old and (c) ROC Curve at 14 years old.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Bibby P., Shepherd J. University of London; London, England: 2004. Developing a New Classification of Urban and Rural Areas for Policy Purposes: The Methods.
    1. Black C., Collins A., Snell M. Encouraging walking: the case of journey-to-school trips in compact urban areas. Urban Stud. 2001;38:1121–1141.
    1. Buliung R.N., Mitra R., Faulkner G. Active school transportation in the Greater Toronto area, Canada: an exploration of trends in space and time (1986–2006) Prev. Med. 2009;48:507–512. - PubMed
    1. Corder K., Sharp S.J., Atkin A.J., Griffin S.J., Jones A.P., Ekelund U., VanSluijs E.M. Change in objectively measured physical activity during the transition to adolescence. Br J Sports Med. 2014 [Epub ahead of print] - PMC - PubMed
    1. D’Haese S., De Meester F., De Bourdeaudhuij I., Deforche B., Cardon G. Criterion distances and environmental correlates of active commuting to school in children. Int. J. Behav. Nutr. Phys. Act. 2011;8:88. - PMC - PubMed

Publication types