The Relationship Between Anthropometric Measurements and Attitudes to Sports Activities Among Secondary School Students of North Khorasan Province in 2017

The perception and attitude of individuals towards the benefits of participating in physical and sports activities are helpful factors that influence their decision to participate in regular and health-related activities. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to investigate the relationship between the anthropometric measurements and attitudes to sport activities among secondary school students of North Khorasan province.

The study population of this cross-sectional and descriptive-analytic study included all the secondary school students in North Khorasan Province. Based on stratified random sampling, 748 students were selected as the statistical sample. For each student, body mass index (BMI), waist- to- hip ratio (WHR) and body fat percentage (BFP) were measured. In addition, Moreover, the attitude to physical activity was measured by Corbin questionnaire. Data were analyzed using chi-square, independent t-test, Pearson correlation and one-way ANOVA at P < 0.05 level.

The findings of the present study showed that the overall prevalence of underweight and overweight in students were 9.6% and 13.8%, respectively. In additionFurthermore , WHR and BFP increased among female students by increasing their of age. Furthermore, there was a significant correlation between the attitudes toward sport activities and the anthropometric measurements of students (P=0.001).

These results indicated the need for setting a schedule providing a program to control and prevent the prevalence of obesity and considering attention to attitudes to sport activities as one of the solutions to reduce overweight and obesity problems among students.