Nursery World - Exercise levels for both boys and girls decline 'long before adolescence'

Levels of exercise decline in most children in the UK by the age of six to seven years - long before adolescence and regardless of gender, research has suggested.

The study, published online in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, aimed to identify the timing of changes in physical activity during childhood and adolescence.

According to the researchers, led by Professor John Reilly from the University of Strathclyde, there is ‘a widely held and influential view’ that physical activity begins to decline in adolescence.

The authors used data from the longitudinal Gateshead Millennium Cohort Study, and studied physical activity levels of 545 participants at least at two different ages, when they were seven years old and then, where possible, again at nine years of age, 12 years of age and 15 years of age.

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