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. 2023;2(1):7.
doi: 10.1186/s44167-023-00016-6. Epub 2023 Apr 3.

Associations of activity, sedentary, and sleep behaviors with cognitive and social-emotional health in early childhood

Christine W St Laurent  1 , Charlotte Lund Rasmussen  2   3   4 , Jennifer F Holmes  1 , Amanda Cremone-Caira  5 , Laura B F Kurdziel  6 , Phillip C Desrochers  7 , Rebecca M C Spencer  1   8
Affiliations

Associations of activity, sedentary, and sleep behaviors with cognitive and social-emotional health in early childhood

Christine W St Laurent et al. J Act Sedentary Sleep Behav. 2023.

Abstract

Background: Early childhood is important for cognitive and social-emotional development, and a time in which to promote healthy movement behaviors (sedentary behavior, physical activity, and sleep). Movement behaviors may have interactive influences on cognition and social-emotional factors in young children, but most previous research has explored them independently. The purpose of this study was to determine if movement behaviors are associated with measures of cognitive and social-emotional health in young children and if so, to describe optimal compositions of movement behaviors of a daily cycle for such outcomes.

Methods: Children (n = 388, 33 to 70 months, 44.6% female) from a clinical trial (ClinicalTrials.gov ID: NCT03285880, first posted September 18, 2017) wore accelerometers on their wrists for 24-h for 9.56 ± 3.3 days. Movement behavior compositions consisted of time spent in sedentary behaviors, light intensity physical activity, moderate to vigorous intensity physical activity (MVPA), and sleep. Outcomes were cognitive (receptive vocabulary, declarative and procedural memory, and executive attention) and social-emotional measures (temperament and behavioral problems). Compositional linear regression models with isometric log ratios were used to investigate the relations between the movement behavior composition and the cognitive and social-emotional health measures. If a significant association was found between the composition and an outcome, we further explored the "optimal" 24-h time-use for said outcome.

Results: Movement behavior compositions were associated with receptive vocabulary. The composition associated with the predicted top five percent of vocabulary scores consisted of 12.1 h of sleep, 4.7 h of sedentary time, 5.6 h of light physical activity, and 1.7 h of MVPA.

Conclusions: While behavior compositions are related to vocabulary ability in early childhood, our findings align with the inconclusiveness of the current evidence regarding other developmental outcomes. Future research exploring activities within these four movement behaviors, that are meaningful to cognitive and social-emotional development, may be warranted.

Supplementary information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s44167-023-00016-6.

Keywords: Children; Cognition; Physical activity; Sedentary behavior; Sleep; Social-emotional.

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Conflict of interest statement

Competing interestsCLR serves as an editorial board member for the Journal of Activity, Sedentary and Sleep Behaviors. The remaining authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Study overview. Actigraphy was measured throughout the full period, but ‘experimental’ days were excluded because all children were encouraged to either nap or stay awake in the afternoon regardless of their typical routine. Cognitive health measures were collected on nap- and wake-promotion days. Social-behavioral health measures were derived from caregiver/parent complete questionnaires that were distributed on Day 1 and collected at the end of the study period
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Participant flow diagram and sample sizes of outcome measures. Participant flow diagram and sample size of outcome measures. (For cognitive health, receptive vocabulary was sought for all participants, but each other cognitive task was only completed on a subset of the participants.)
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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