Developing, implementing and evaluating interventions together with children to stimulate a healthy lifestyle

Despite the emergence of many preventive programs, the number of obese kids in Amsterdam continues to be alarmingly high. Additionally, it has been shown that many kids with parents of low socioeconomic class are especially vulnerable when it comes to adopting an unhealthy lifestyle, and are therefore more prone to being overweight. One way to tackle this problem is through Participatory Action Research (PAR), which aims to involve the people the research focuses on itself (in this case the children and their parents). Therefore, the keyword in the ‘Kids in Action-program is ‘participation’. In collaboration with children, who are the experts on their own living environments, the main health-related problems will be identified. By including the children in this process, we aim to design the most appropriate initiatives to encourage healthy behavior.

Many interventions have been developed and implemented to tackle childhood obesity, but the most affected group of children – i.e. from families with a low Socio-Economic-Status (SES) and from non-Western backgrounds - is difficult to reach. Therefore the current research project, named ‘Kids in Action’, uses a novel approach by engaging children from a low SES neighborhood as co-researchers, i.e. Participatory Action Research (PAR). We believe that by engaging the target group in this process, more effective interventions can be developed.

Baseline measurement takes place in the schoolyear 2016-2017. T1 will be in March-April 2018, T2 will be in March-April 2019.

Interventions will be developed together with children. The interventions will be aimed at increasing their physical activity levels and improving their dietary behavior.