Mexican-American adolescents were significantly more likely to be overweight and less fit than non-Hispanic white adolescents due to lower psychosocial outcomes, which may further affect levels of physical fitness and academic performance (Sonneville et al., 2012; Walpole et al., 2011). Much evidence suggested that physical fitness declines and weight gain are a result of physical inactivity and increased food intake during summer break (Downy & Boughton, 2007; Tovar et al., 2010). The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of psychosocial -outcomes such as self-confidence and body image dissatisfaction and five-week summer school program, including 12 hours/week of physical activity, on changes in BMI, flexibility, muscular strength and cardiorespiratory fitness in Hispanic adolescents during summer break.
Method:
137 high school students (67 summer school attendants and 70 non-summer school attendants) completed a questionnaire regarding self-confidence, self-body shape image, and fast food consumption before summer break and two fitness tests were conducted to measure muscular strength and endurance (push-up), flexibility (sit and reach), estimated VO2max (Queens’ college step test), and body composition (BMI) before and after summer break. The correlation test between each variable in the questionnaire and changes in fitness levels during summer break was calculated for summer school attendants and non-summer school attendants using the Pearson correlation coefficient at P<0.05.
Analysis/Results:
For the five-week summer school attendants, none of fitness variables significantly changed through summer break and changes in physical fitness and BMI were not affected by any psychosocial outcomes. For non-summer school attendants, self-confidence showed positive relation with levels of physical activity (r=.459, P<.001) and flexibility (r=.399, P=.001) and negative relation with BMI (r=-.542, P<.001) and fast food consumption (r=-.588, P<0.001). Significant relations were also found between body image dissatisfaction and levels of physical activity (r=-.409, P <.001), flexibility (r=-.337, P=.004), BMI (r=.37, P=0.002), and fast food consumption (r=0.548, P<0.001) in non-school attendants.
Conclusions:
Levels of self-confidence and body image dissatisfaction can be key factors which may motivate them to attend physical fitness and to control their diet during summer break. It is suggested that comprehensive intervention for psychosocial outcomes and nutritional education may help improve levels of physical fitness in Hispanic adolescents. However, levels of physical fitness were not affected by psychosocial outcomes and fast food consumption in five-week summer school attendants, which suggests that an extended school program within the summer break may decrease prevalence of overweight and obesity in Hispanic children.