Patterns of Leisure Time and Non-Leisure Time Physical Activity of Korean Immigrant Women

Abstract

Our purpose in this study was to examine the patterns of physical activity and demographic characteristics associated with those patterns in Korean immigrants in the United States. Participants were 197 women, and the International Physical Activity Questionnaire was utilized. The inactive pattern was the most frequent pattern in all domains of physical activity except household physical activity. There were differences among the patterns of physical activity that were associated with variations in demographic characteristics. Health care providers who serve immigrants should assess physical activity level and demographic characteristics of the immigrants to enhance their physical activity.

Acknowledgments

This research was supported by the Sigma Theta Tau Research Award (Alpha Lambda Chapter). Manuscript preparation was supported by the Nursing Research Training Program in Symptom Management, Grant #T32 NR07088, National Institute of Nursing Research/National Institutes of Health.

Notes

^†These criteria applied to job-related, transportation-related, household, and leisure time physical activity. The frequency and duration of vigorous-intensity physical activity was not assessed for the domain of transportation-related physical activity, and the frequency and duration of walking for household physical activity was not assessed because of the nature of the physical activity questionnaire used in the current study.

^a n = 76.

FIGURE 1 Number of participants at each pattern within each domain of physical activity.

^b n = 59.

^c n = 166.

^d n = 125.