American journal of preventive medicine
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Interventions to increase children's physical activity have had limited success. One reason may be that children and their parents overestimate children's levels of physical activity, although there is a small amount of data on this topic. ⋯ Most parents of inactive children wrongly consider their children to be sufficiently active; parents of children with a lower fat mass index appear to assume that their children are adequately active. Increasing awareness regarding health benefits of physical activity beyond weight control might help reverse misperceptions of physical activity levels and encourage behavior change.
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With the epidemic of childhood obesity, there is national interest in state-level school policies related to nutrition and physical activity, policies adopted by states, and relationships to youth obesity. ⋯ States appear to be doing a better job adopting FSN policies than PA or WA policies, and adoption of policies is correlated with youth obesity. Continued monitoring of these policies seems to be warranted.