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Transportation Behaviors: Studying the Health Behaviors of Decorah Students with an Emphasis on Walking and Biking to School. Nicole Littlejohn, Audrey Seitz, and Kristin Trudell Luther College Psychology Department Abstract How do Decorah students get to/from school? With an interest in children’s health behavior, this study focused on factors influencing transportation methods. 513 students were surveyed at Carrie Lee Elementary, John Cline Elementary and Decorah Middle School. Most students were found to take the bus or a family vehicle to/from school. In terms of walking/biking, 9.5% of students walk/bike to school. 12.3% of students walk/bike from school. Contributing factors included the following on a significance level of p<.05: distance from school, school activities, traffic speed, amount of traffic, walking/biking companion, sidewalk availability, and crossing guard presence. While a majority of parents believed that walking/biking was a healthy activity, it was found to be impractical for many due to the above factors. Introduction What methods do children take to go to/from John Cline Elementary, Carrie Lee Elementary, and Decorah Middle School? Surveys were given to students at John Cline Elementary, Carrie Lee Elementary, and Decorah Middle School the week of October 13th. Students were asked to take it home to their parents/guardians in order to be filled out. The survey asked questions such as “On most days how does your child arrive and leave for home after school?”, “What issues affected your decision to allow or not allow your child to walk or bike?” and “How healthy do you believe that walking or biking is for your child?”. 513 surveys were returned. It is hypothesized that most children are currently taking the school bus due to travel distance. It is also thought that while most parents view walking or biking as a healthy activity, distance and time constraints inhibit children from walking or biking. According to the surveys, the main reasons for children not walking or biking to and from school are due to distance, after school activities, speed of traffic, amount of traffic, having a walking companion, sidewalks, and crossing guards. Methods Participants were students in the Decorah School system. The schools included John Cline Elementary, Carrie Lee Elementary and Decorah Middle School which includes grades K-8. Surveys were handed out to all students enrolled in these three schools. There were 513 total participants, including 254 males and 258 females. 205 surveys were received back from John Cline, 187 surveys from Carrie Lee, and 121 from the Middle School. Ages ranged from 4 to 14 years old. The surveys were obtained from the Northeast Iowa Safe Routes to School from Ann Mansfield, and distributed them to John Cline Elementary, Carrie Lee Elementary, and Decorah Middle School. The survey consisted of 16 questions, one page front and back (Mansfield, 2008). Results We analyzed the data collected through surveys using SPSS. To analyze the contributing factors, we created a Frequency Table using Excel and SPSS. We also used a Pearson Chi-Square to determine the significance of each factor. We found the following factors to be significant on a level of p<.05: distance from school, after school activities, speed of traffic, amount of traffic, availability of an adult to go with, sidewalk availability, and presence of a crossing guard. These factors were influential in the parents’ decision to allow their child to walk or bike to/from school. We used SPSS to calculate the percentages of students walking or biking to/from school. 6.6% of students walk to school and 2.9% of students bike to school. 9.6% of students walk from school and 2.7% of students bike from school. Conclusion We found several factors that indicate why students may or may not be walking or biking. These can all be seen in Figure 3. Our research suggests that 27.1% of parents surveyed considered sidewalks to be a large enough issue to prevent their children from walking or biking to/from school. We found that 82.4% of parents state distance as a main concern for walking or biking. 58.7% of students surveyed live more than 2 miles away, making walking or biking impractical. While many parents believed walking/biking was healthy, we found 88.7% of students take either the bus or a family vehicle to school. We also found 85.4% take either the bus or a family vehicle from school. 9.5% of Decorah students walk/bike to school and 12.3 % of Decorah students walk/bike from school. ,[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],Figure 4 Figure 2 Figure 3 Figure 1

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