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Health Education Research Advance Access originally published online on September 19, 2007
Health Education Research 2008 23(2):325-334; doi:10.1093/her/cym043
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© 2007 The Author(s).
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/uk/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Factors associated with children being driven to school: implications for walk to school programs

Li Ming Wen1,*, Denise Fry1, Chris Rissel1, Helen Dirkis1, Angela Balafas1 and Dafna Merom2

1 Health Promotion Unit, Sydney South West Area Health Service, Level 9, King George V Building, Missenden Road, Camperdown, New South Wales 2050, Australia
2 Centre for Physical Activity and Health, University of Sydney, New South Wales, School of Public Health Australia

* Correspondence to: Li Ming Wen. E-mail: lmwen{at}email.cs.nsw.gov.au

In this study, we examined factors associated with children being driven to school. Participants were 1603 students (aged 9–11 years) and their parents from 24 public primary schools in inner western Sydney, Australia. Students recorded their modes of travel to and from school for 5 days in a student survey. Parents recorded their demographic data, their attitudes to travel, and their modes of travel to work, using a self-administered survey. An analysis of the two linked data sets found that 41% of students travelled by car to or from school for more than 5 trips per week. Almost a third (32%) of students walked all the way. Only 1% of students rode a bike and 22% used more than one mode of travel. Of those who were driven, 29% lived less than 1 km and a further 18% lived between 1 and 1.5 km from school. Factors associated with car travel (after adjusting for other potential confounders) were mode of parents’ travel to work, parent attitudes, number of cars in the household, and distance from home to school. To be effective, walk to school programs need to address the link between parent journey to work and student journey to school.

Received on January 29, 2006; accepted on May 18, 2007


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