Abstract
Background: Active transport to school is a potential way to incorporate daily physical activity and address concerningly low adolescent physical activity levels. Walking and cycling to school are the two most common forms of active transport to school and have been extensively studied amongst urban adolescents. The prevalence and perceptions of walking and cycling to school in rural settings remain largely unknown. As rural and urban settings have distinct social and built environment contexts, urban findings are not necessarily transferrable to rural adolescents. Furthermore, walking and cycling are distinct practices with different motivations and barriers. This study examined rates and perceptions of walking versus cycling to school amongst adolescents living ≤4.8 km of school in rural areas of Otago, New Zealand.
Methods: Adolescents (n=397; 57.7% female; 15.3±1.3 years) from 11 rural Otago, New Zealand secondary schools completed the online BEATS Rural Student Survey and reported their travel to school behaviours and perceptions of walking and cycling to school. Distance to school was calculated using Geographic Information Systems analysis. Data were analysed using paired t-tests and Chi-square tests.
Results: Of adolescents living within 4.8 km of school, 49% walked and 16% cycled to school. Compared to cycling, a greater proportion of adolescents perceived walking to school as more pleasant (walking vs cycling: 62% vs 45%), providing better social opportunities (57% vs 25%), requiring less prior planning (13% vs 21%) and causing less sweating (22% vs 34%) (all p˂0.001). More adolescents perceived that walking versus cycling received greater support from peers (61% vs 29%), parents (71% vs 40%), and schools (36% vs 25%) and reported greater availability of footpaths versus cycle lanes (86% vs 44%) (all p˂0.001). Compared to cycling, a greater proportion of adolescents believed that walking to school was safer (walking vs cycling: 93% vs 81%) and perceived that their parents thought walking to school was safe (92% vs 86%) (all p˂0.001). More adolescents expressed confidence (walking vs cycling: 90% vs 72%), desire (47% vs 22%), and intention (54% vs 20%) to walk than cycle to school (all p˂0.001). Greater perceived barriers to walking than cycling to school were decision making control (walking vs cycling: 72% vs 78%), feeling tired (44% vs 37%), trip distance (17% vs 7%) and duration (42% vs 14%), and unpleasant weather (59% vs 47%) (all p˂0.001). Most adolescents believed that walking and cycling to school were great ways to get exercise (walking vs cycling: 93% vs 87%; ns).
Conclusions: Walking to school was more prevalent and perceived more favourably than cycling to school by adolescents living ≤4.8 km of school in rural areas of Otago, New Zealand. More adolescents reported walking as safer, with greater social and infrastructural support and fewer barriers than cycling to school. A greater proportion expressed behavioural intention to walk versus cycle to school. These findings reveal distinct differences in adolescents’ use and perceptions of walking versus cycling to school in rural areas. Future interventions must consider context-specific perceptions of walking versus cycling to school to appropriately design mode-specific interventions for adolescents.