Teun Remmers

Playability of school environments and afterschool PA | 105 Introduction The short- and long-term benefits of physical activity (PA) in children are well known. The role of attributes of the physical environment in regulation of children’s PA behavior has been given increasing attention in recent years, but results so far have been mixed (1). Although the use of objective measurements is preferred in PA-related research involving children (e.g. by accelerometers), investigating relationships between PA and the physical environment using objective measurements proves to be challenging (2). A first challenge is assessing children’s exposure to detailed elements of the physical environment. Researchers in the disciplines of health sciences, urban planning, and leisure studies all contribute to the development of measurements assessing these environmental elements (3). In general, three types of measurements can be identified; self-administered surveys, systematically completed audits, and GIS-based measures (4). In terms of objective measurements, GIS-based measures may currently be more suitable for assessing design-related features of neighborhoods on a larger geographic scale. Audits, in turn, may be more suitable to assess qualities of environmental elements in smaller-scaled environmental settings (4, 5). In studies investigating PA in children, audits may thus be favorable in detecting (quality of) small-scaled environmental opportunities that may potentially influence leisure time PA (e.g. attractiveness and quality of public spaces or playgrounds). Recently, an instrument assessing detailed playground characteristics using systematic in-person audits of environments have been introduced as a “playability index” (6). This index stems from the Environmental Assessment of Public Recreational Spaces (EAPRS) (7) and assesses qualities of playground-features such as facilities, aesthetics, proximity, and accessibility. A second challenge when investigating relationships between PA and the physical environment stems from the paradigm that PA occurs in several conceptual domains (i.e. leisure, school, transport and home) (8-10). Investigating associations between the environment and overall PA may lead to inconsistencies, as different PA domains are regulated by distinct environmental factors (4). An example of domain-specificity relates to children’s school schedule, which largely limits their spatial freedom- and thus environmental exposure during weekdays. Separately investigating after-school PA (ASPA) helps to increase our understanding children’s context-specific PA and its environmental attributes (2, 9, 11-13). Studies using subjective measures of ASPA generally reported that boys seemed to be more active after school than girls (14, 15) and suggested a negative influence of technology-related sedentary activities on ASPA (15, 16). The studies that used objective measures generally indicated that ASPA contributed considerably to total PA, that boys were indeed more active after school (17-27). More specifically, one study reported that children do not compensate inactive days at school by increasing ASPA on a weekly basis (28). Three studies reported on relationships between ASPA and objectively audited features of the environment (22, 24, 26). Results generally revealed that time outside resulted in 2-3 fold higher ASPA (26), but no associations were found between the number and proximity of PA- facilities / public open spaces / playgrounds in the