Science News
Researchers at the University of South Australia developed an app called the Healthy-Day-App to encourage healthy behaviors in children. The details of the project are published in PLOS ONE.
The Healthy-Day-App
In order to develop the app, the researchers conducted a study that examined the relationships between children’s use of time, health, and academic outcomes. They also assessed 1685 data records from the Australian Child Health CheckPoint study.
It was found that reducing children’s screen time and encouraging physical activity significantly lowered their risk of obesity. This also improved their physiological and psychological wellness and academic performances.
These findings were incorporated into the Healthy-Day-App, which boasts features to help parents and professionals plan the “perfect day” for kids and manage their schedules so as to maximize their physical and mental health, academic performance, and social relationships.
How The App Works
The Healthy-Day-App tracks a child’s current activities and arranges his/her 24-hour time usage across seven categories (such as sleep, screen time, school time, passive transport, domestic/self-care, etc.).
It takes into account factors like body weight, mental health, academic performance, puberty, socio-economic status, etc. It also includes an advanced option for health professionals to lend their expertise about child-rearing over the app.
One of the lead researchers, Dr. Dumuid, said: “The Healthy-Day-App lets parents, carers and health professionals consider possible changes to a child’s day [as] … How children use their time can have a big impact on their health, wellbeing, and productivity.”
To Know More You May Refer To
Dumuid, D., Olds, T., Wake, M., Lund Rasmussen, C., Pedišić, Ž., Hughes, J. H., Foster, D. J., Walmsley, R., Atkin, A. J., Straker, L., Fraysse, F., Smith, R. T., Neumann, F., Kenett, R. S., Jarle Mork, P., Bennett, D., Doherty, A., & Stanford, T. (2022). Your best day: An interactive app to translate how time reallocations within a 24-hour day are associated with health measures. PloS one, 17(9), e0272343. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0272343