https://doi.org/10.37527/2021.71.S1
1Universidade Federal Do Tocantins, Miracema, Brazil.
Objective. The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic continues to pose profound challenges to society. Its spread has been mitigated through strategies including social distancing; however, this may result in the adoption of a sedentary lifestyle. In this sense, we designed a cohort study aiming to investigate physical activity and screen time in young adults during the COVID-19 pandemic and to test psychometric properties of the tools for assessing these behaviours during the pandemic periods. In the present study, we aimed to test the reliability of an online screen time questionnaire.
Methods. We applied the South American youth/child cardiovascular and environmental study (SAYCARE, online format) screen time questionnaire in 117 university students from a South American city. The questionnaire measured duration, for weekdays and weekend days, in hours per day of TV watching, electronic games, computer use, study and passive commuting. We applied the questionnaires two times with 14 days of interval.
Results. Our sample was composed, mainly, by female participants (68.7%), aged between 21 and 25 years (44.6%) and from the Physical Education course (22.29%). The participants reported median ranging from 0.0 hours (Interquartile range, IQR: 0.0-3.0) for electronic games to 3.0 hours (IQR: 1.0-5.0) for computer use in weekdays; and 0.0 hours (IQR: 0.0-1.0) for passive commuting (IQR 1.0-5.0) to 4.0 hours (IQR: 2.0-6.0) for computer use in weekdays, for questionnaire first and second application, respectively. All variables showed acceptable reliability (Spearman’s correlation coefficient > 0.30 and p < 0.05).
Conclusions. The SAYCARE screen time questionnaire, in online format, presents acceptable reliability. In this sense, the questionnaire is an alternative to measure screen time in a pandemic period.
Keywords: reliability, questionnaire, creen time, metabolic syndrome, university students.