Journal of Child & Adolescent Behavior
Zhang et al., J Child Adolesc Behav 2014, 2:5 http://dx.doi.org/10.4172/2375-4494.1000172
Research Article
Open Access
Social Cognitive Beliefs Predicting Children’s Physical Activity and Cardiovascular Fitness in Physical Education Peng Zhang1*, Zachary Pope3, Chaoqun Huang2 and Zan Gao3 1College
of Health Sciences, East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania, USA
2Wayland
Baptist University, Plainview, Texas, USA
3University
of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA
*Corresponding
author: Peng Zhang, College of Health Sciences, East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania, 210 Zimbar Hall, 200 Prospect St., East Stroudsburg, PA, 18301, USA, Tel: (570) 422-3050, E-mail:
[email protected] Received date: September30, 2014, Accepted date: October 24, 2014, Published date: October 29, 2014
Copyright: © 2014 Zhang P et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract Purpose: This study examined the predictive utility of children’s self-efficacy, outcome expectancy, and satisfaction on their perceived persistence/effort, physical activity (PA) levels, and cardiovascular fitness. Method: Participants were 307 sixth through eighth grade students enrolled in a 90-minute physical education class on alternate days. Participants completed questionnaires assessing self-efficacy, outcome expectancy, satisfaction, and perceived persistence/effort during the second to last week of the school year. During the last week of school the Progressive Aerobic Cardiovascular Endurance Run (PACER) test was administered and in-class PA levels were measured via pedometers (Yamax Digi-Walker SW-701). Multiple regression analyses were used to determine how self-efficacy, outcome expectancy, and satisfaction predicted children’s persistence/effort, PA levels, and cardiovascular fitness. Results: Correlation analysis indicated all variables were significantly associated with one another (rs = .17 to . 59, ps < .01) while regression analyses showed outcome expectancy (ß = .36, p
