Validity and Reliability of the School Physical Activity Environment Questionnaire

Abstract

The goal of the current study was to establish the factor validity of the Questionnaire Assessing School Physical Activity Environment (Robertson-Wilson, Lévesque, & Holden, 2007) using confirmatory factor analysis procedures. Another goal was to establish internal reliability and test–retest reliability. The confirmatory factor analysis results of this study supported a slightly altered version of the Questionnaire Assessing School Physical Activity Environment's school physical activity environment subscale. Internal reliability was adequate, while test–retest reliability was questionable. In brief, the pattern of findings indicated that while the original Questionnaire Assessing School Physical Activity Environment is likely adequate for some research purposes, a slightly modified version (Questionnaire Assessing School Physical Activity Environment-R) was psychometrically stronger. However, given the distinct differences in samples used in the original validation study and the current study, more research on the psychometric properties of the Questionnaire Assessing School Physical Activity Environment is needed to determine if the current results and Robertson-Wilson et al.'s (2007) results are sample specific.

Keywords:

• validity
• health
• exercise
• ecological theory

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This study was part of a larger project funded by the W. K. Kellogg Foundation to the Michigan Department of Community Health; Office of the Surgeon General. The authors thank the research staff in the Department of Biostatistics and Research Epidemiology at Henry Ford Health System for data entry and management.