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Selected lifestyle factors of the child at the beginning of school attendance (5th and 7th year of life) - the importance of family
HECZKOVÁ, Petra
Lifestyle is one of the most important factors with respect to population health. By keeping to the principles of healthy lifestyle in children we are investing in important patterns in their future lives. Future population health status is closely related to these ,,investments''. The objective of presented bachelor work ,,Selected lifestyle factors of a child at the beginning of school attendance (the 5th and 7th years of life) - the importance of family'' is to characterize parental influence in keeping to selected healthy lifestyle principles and, at the same time, to show ways how parents spend free time with their pre-school and early school-aged children in the context of healthy lifestyle. The impulse for selecting the topic of the presented work was the interest in finding how specific factors influence the child's lifestyle and in finding out whether the parents realize this influence. As a principal method for my work I selected quantitative questionnaire survey approach. A study sample consisting of children at the age of 5 and 7 years and their parents was selected. The sex of children was not considered. The study sample size corresponds with the longitudinal character of the study and is completely satisfactory as far as statistical analysis and hypotheses testing is concerned. The exact number of participants at the age of 5 is 3034 and at the age of 7 is 2781. The goal of the study was to characterize - using secondary data from the ELSPAC study - the parental influence in keeping to selected healthy lifestyle principles and, at the same time, to present ways how parents spend free time with their pre-school and early school-aged children in the context of healthy lifestyle. The 5th and 7th years of life characterize the beginning of school attendance. I established three hypotheses (related to the determined goals) in which I presume the following: parental education influences the choice of interests and ways how a child spends his/her free time at the beginning of school attendance, children's lifestyle copies lifestyle of parents, the amount of time which the parents spend with their child decreases with the child's age. The first hypothesis was partially confirmed and the survey demonstrated that the mothers' education does have an effect on some of the monitored free time activities of a five-year-old child. The second hypothesis was confirmed completely. The survey demonstrated an important effect of the mother on the pre- and early-school aged child's lifestyle. The father-child activities are limited to those in which a definite effect on the child's lifestyle cannot be confirmed. The third hypothesis was also completely confirmed. It was confirmed that the amount of parent-child activities diminishes when compared in five- and seven-year-old children. The benefit of this work is that it gives an indication of the family's influence on the lifestyle of a child at the beginning of school attendance and its possible use in the area of preventive medicine, with respect to increasing numbers of overweight children with diminished physical performance. Accentuating prevention in basic elements of healthy lifestyle is crucial, especially as it should carry over to everyday family life, targeting primarily parents. The parents should be informed about the magnitude of the impact their own behavior and lifestyle can have on their children's future health status and life in general.
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