Objectively measured physical activity in population-representative parent-child pairs: parental modelling matters and is context-specific

Table 4 Total, direct and indirect effects on children’s moderate to vigorous physical activity (MVPA)

Independent variables:	Direct effect on children’s MVPA (in min/day) (c-path)	Indirect effect on children’s MVPA (mediated by parental physical activity behaviour) (in min/day) (ab-path)	Total effect on children’s MVPA (in min/day)	Size of the effect on children’s MVPA^a
Characteristics child
Age child (youngest = ref.)	−30.1	–	−30.1	0.66
Sex child (m = ref.)	−21.9	–	−21.9	0.40
Overweight (no = ref.)	−5.5	–	− 5.5	0.07
Parental physical activity behaviour (PPAB)	–	7.1	7.1	0.18
Parental characteristics
Age parent (youngest tertile = ref.)	−4.1	0.1*7.1 = 0.7	−3.4	0.08
Sex parent (m = ref.))	1.9	−0.4*7.1. = −2.8	− 0.9	0.03
Overweight parent (no = ref.)	7.1	−0.6*7.1 = −-4.3	2.8	0.11
Family characteristics
Workload and siblings (factor 1)	1.2	0.0*7.1 = 0.0	1.2	0.043
Sociocultural family environment (nationality and education of the parents = factor 2)	−0.1	−0.1*7.1. = − 0.7	−0.8	0.01
Co-activity (yes = ref.)	0.2	0.2*7.1 = 1.4	1.6	0.00
Parent-child relationship (lowest tertile = ref.)	0.7	0.1*7.1 = 0.7	1.4	0.02
Environment
Walkability & Urbanity (factor 3)	0.7	0.1*7.1. = 0.7	1.4	0.03
Language (German = ref.)	−5.2	−0.2*7.1 = −1.4	6.6	0.08

The total effect = indirect effect (via parental physical activity behavior) + direct effect.
The indirect effect is calculated by multiplying the association between the independent variable and parental physical activity behavior (a-path) with the association between parental physical activity behavior and children’s MVPA (b-path)
The direct effect describes the association between the independent variable and children’s MVPA adjusted for the parental physical activity behavior (see also Fig. 2)
MVPA = moderate to vigorous physical activity, PPAB = parental physical activity behavior
^aDefined as square root of eta squared (i.e., the partial correlation between MVPA of the child and the respective variable, after adjustment for all other variables)

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