Relationship between Fundamental Movement Skills and Physical Activity in Preschool-aged Children: A Systematic Review

Fei Xin, Si-Tong Chen, Cain Clark, Jin-Tao Hong, Yang Liu and Yu-Jun Cai
Additional contact information
Fei Xin: School of Physical Education and Sport Training, Shanghai University of Sport, Shanghai 200438, China
Si-Tong Chen: Institute for Health and Sport, Victoria University, Melbourne 3000, Australia
Cain Clark: Faculty of Health and Life Sciences, Coventry University, Coventry CV1 5FB, UK
Jin-Tao Hong: School of Physical Education and Sport Training, Shanghai University of Sport, Shanghai 200438, China
Yang Liu: School of Physical Education and Sport Training, Shanghai University of Sport, Shanghai 200438, China
Yu-Jun Cai: School of Physical Education and Sport Training, Shanghai University of Sport, Shanghai 200438, China

IJERPH, 2020, vol. 17, issue 10, 1-17

Abstract: Preschool-aged children are in a critical period of developing fundamental movement skills (FMS). FMS have a close link with physical activity (PA). This study aimed to systematically review the associations between FMS and PA in preschool-aged children. Searching Cochrane Library, Web of Science, PubMed, ScienceDirect, and EBSCO (including SPORTDiscus, ERIC, and Academic Search Premier) was utilized to conduct a systematic review of the available literature. Studies were included if they examined associations between FMS and PA among typically developing children aged 3–6 years, published between January 2000 and April 2020. A total of 26 studies met the inclusion criteria, including 24 cross-sectional studies and two cohort studies. There was a strong level of evidence to support low to moderate associations between moderate to vigorous physical activity and components of FMS, specifically, the total FMS (r = 0.11–0.48, R 2 = 16%–19%) and object control skill (r = 0.16–0.46, β = 0.28–0.49, R 2 = 10.4%–16.9%). Similar associations were also found between the total physical activity and components of FMS, specifically, the total FMS (r = 0.10–0.45, R 2 = 16%), locomotor skills (r = 0.14–0.46, R 2 = 21.3%), and objective control skills (r = 0.16–0.44, β = 0.47, R 2 = 19.2%). There was strong evidence that there is no significant association between light physical activity and FMS, specifically, total FMS and locomotor skills. The associations, including “stability skills–PA” and “locomotor skills–moderate to vigorous PA”, were uncertain due to insufficient evidence. Our findings provide strong evidence of associations between specific FMS components and a specific PA intensity. Future studies should consider using a longitudinal study design in order to explore the causal relationship between specific-intensity PA and the FMS subdomain.

Keywords: fundamental movement skills; physical activity; early years; association (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/10/3566/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/10/3566/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:17:y:2020:i:10:p:3566-:d:360259

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().