Park-goers May Not Be Getting Much Exercise, Study Finds

You might think that visiting a public park is a good way to get your daily dose of exercise, but researchers at North Carolina State University found that more than half of park-goers in two U.S. urban parks systems actually engaged in little to no physical activity.

A study published in the American Journal of Preventative Medicine found that 70 percent of parks users in Tampa, Fla., and 51 percent of park users in Chicago were observed engaging in sedentary activities. However, children in both cities were more likely than adults to be participating in vigorous activities.

Dr. Myron Floyd, professor of parks, recreation and tourism management at NC State, hopes the findings will help park planners, designers and policymakers create parks that are more inviting and conducive to physical activity.

“We know that people use parks; however, not until recently have we tried to measure the amount of physical activity that you actually get while in the park,” Floyd says. “We can then analyze that information and look at ways to reconfigure or redesign a space to make it more inviting for physical activity.”

The study examined how much activity was taking place in neighborhood parks; the environmental features that influenced physical activity in the parks; and how the levels of activity varied in parks in neighborhoods with different concentrations of white, African-American and Hispanic residents.

The researchers observed park-goers and ranked their activity levels as sedentary, moderate and vigorous. “We observed a lot of people on softball fields and you think, ‘Great, they are playing softball,’ but it’s a very sedentary sport,” Floyd says. “When you look at the energy expenditure values for those individuals and compare it with people fishing or using the dog play areas, you get about the same amount of activity.”

Floyd says the research findings provide evidence that the configuration of a park – having more athletic fields, trails, etc. – can increase physical activity in parks. For example, features that led to more sedentary behavior in Tampa were picnic shelters, which people were using for parties. However, in Chicago, there were fewer picnic shelters and more athletic fields.

“This sounds like common sense, but now we have data that illustrate the association between activity level and park features, which is something that hasn’t been demonstrated before,” Floyd says.

The researchers examined parks in diverse communities because “In general, we know that African-Americans and Latinos are less likely to get recommended amounts of physical activity, so one of the reasons we did this study was to understand how parks can increase activity in these populations,” Floyd says. “Parks can be an important setting for increasing physical activity in low-income and minority communities because they are usually free or low cost and widely available in most areas. One of the things we need to look at next is if there is equal access to quality parks and quality facilities.”

Floyd points out that parks do provide a variety of benefits. “Watching your children play, fishing and letting your dog run around can be enjoyable activities as well,” he says. “But given these findings we would like to see more moderate and vigorous activity.”

This study was funded by a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Active Living Research program. The program is focused on finding evidence to support policy changes to make communities more active.

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