Feasibility of a novel web-based physical activity questionnaire for young children

Accurate assessment of children's physical activity is critical in determining associations between childhood physical activity and health later in life. We have developed a web-based questionnaire, KidActive-Q, to assess physical activity in early childhood. The feasibility and reproducibility of KidActive-Q were assessed in a sample of 20 children aged 2 to 6 years. The questionnaire was distributed to parents via e-mail on two occasions. The median time required to complete KidActive-Q was 2.5 minutes. All the parents reported that the questionnaire was easy or very easy to fill. The intraclass correlations for test-retest reliability were 0.60 (95% confidence interval: 0.31–0.88) for daily time spent outdoors, and 0.85 (95% confidence interval: 0.72–0.97) for daily time watching television. Our results suggest that KidActive-Q is a user-friendly tool for assessing physical activity in early childhood. To our knowledge, this is the first web-based questionnaire specifically developed for young children.