Perceptions of Peer and Parental Support: Feasibility of a Physical Activity Intervention for Adolescent Girls.

Physical activity (PA) has a wide range of health benefits. Children with high levels of social support are more likely to achieve adequate levels of PA. The purposes of this pilot study were to examine the impact of an after-school intervention on perceived peer and parental support among adolescent girls and to identify correlates of support to explore in future studies to increase PA. Seventeen low-active girls in 6th-7th grade were recruited from a local middle school to participate in an 8- week intervention where they were exposed to various types of PA and discussed PA topics with their peers and college-aged mentors. Peer and parental support, self-reported physical activity, moderate-to-vigorous physical activity, and physical literacy self-evaluation were measured before and after the 8-week intervention. Paired samples t-tests indicated that parental support increased from pre- to post-intervention (t = 4.4, p < .001, d = 1.2, 95% CI = 1.7, 5.18), whereas there was a small, non-statistically significant increase in peer support (t = 1.5, p = 0.15, d = .4, 95% C I = -.89, 5.04). Correlations for the variables at pre-intervention indicated that there were significant correlations between peer and parental support (r = 0.74, p = 0.004), whereas at post-intervention there were significant correlations between peer and parental support (r = 0.83, p < .001), and physical literacy with peer support (r = 0.70, p = 0.008) and parental support (r = 0.69, p = 0.009). These preliminary results suggest that a PA intervention may increase perceptions of parent support and that physical literacy may be a variable to target in future interventions to address PA in this population.