Table 1. Descriptive statistics of individual level variables for adult Chinese men and women from selected waves of the China Health and Nutrition Surveys.
| Men | Women | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1991 | 1997 | 2006 | 1991 | 1997 | 2006 | |
| Physical Activity (MET-hrs/week) | ||||||
| Occupational Activity | 370.6 (218.0) | 334.4 (214.2) | 241.5 (177.5) | 399.7 (264.6) | 340.1 (242.5) | 217.1 (191.8) |
| Home Activity | 19.1 (34.6) | 11.7 (31.6) | 5.6 (18.3) | 61.3 (58.5) | 46.8 (56.9) | 25.3 (47.7) |
| Leisure Activity | No data | 1.4 (7.6) | 3.6 (16.0) | No data | 0.6 (4.9) | 2.3 (15.0) |
| Transportation Activity | 2.6 (9.7) | 1.9 (10.3) | 2.5 (11.0) | 1.3 (5.0) | ||
| Total Activities | 350.0 (214.7) | 252.7 (176.9) | 390.0 (252.0) | 246.1 (196.4) | ||
| Control Variables | ||||||
| Age (years) | 35.2 (9.9) | 36.7 (10.2) | 40.4 (9.8) | 35.0 (9.9) | 37.5 (9.8) | 40.9 (9.2) |
| Married (%) | 79.7 | 78.7 | 83.9 | 81.0 | 84.1 | 89.4 |
| Living Alone (%) | 0.2 | 0.2 | 0.3 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.3 |
| Predicted real household income (in 2006 yuan) | 2227.2 (1447.8) | 2546.0 (2361.3) | 5242.8 (8046.9) | 2240.1 (1595.7) | 2550.3 (2264.4) | 5075.9 (7785.6) |
| No education (%) | 15.0 | 9.8 | 6.5 | 34.0 | 27.9 | 17.8 |
| Completed primary education (%) | 62.7 | 64.5 | 55.9 | 50.1 | 52.9 | 53.6 |
| Completed secondary education (%) | 15.3 | 17.6 | 20.6 | 11.5 | 12.5 | 14.4 |
| Completed technical or vocational training (%) | 3.2 | 4.1 | 9.0 | 2.5 | 4.4 | 7.2 |
| Completed university (%) | 3.8 | 4.0 | 9.0 | 1.9 | 2.4 | 7.0 |
| Participation in Activities | ||||||
| In paid, market or self employment (%) | 96.72 | 94.03 | 86.81 | 92.92 | 88.53 | 78.16 |
| Did any domestic chores (%) | 52.48 | 45.07 | 40.83 | 92.44 | 90.35 | 89.36 |
| Time spent on domestic chores (in hrs/wk) § | 14.99 (16.11) | 10.88 (16.55) | 5.77 (10.66) | 28.01 (23.03) | 22.14 (22.26) | 11.86 (19.04) |
| Exercised for leisure (%) $ | No data | 15.58 | 13.15 | No data | 6.85 | 8.44 |
| Time spent exercising (in hrs/wk) § | 4.84 (5.05) | 5.63 (5.81) | 4.38 (5.22) | 5.81 (7.65) | ||
| Bicycled for transportation (%) | 34.64 | 19.26 | 27.27 | 17.40 | ||
| Time spent bicycling (in hrs/wk) § | 4.56 (3.15) | 4.58 (3.86) | 3.80 (3.15) | 3.16 (1.47) | ||
| Walked for transportation (%) | 58.41 | 38.29 | 63.38 | 38.48 | ||
| Time spent walking (in hrs/wk) § | 3.83 (2.15) | 3.87 (3.70) | 4.35 (3.01) | 3.28 (2.18) | ||
| Averaged ≥ 30 min/day on transportation or leisure activities (%)¥ | 50.65 | 32.72 | 46.30 | 28.25 | ||
| N | 2864 | 2949 | 2601 | 3109 | 2963 | 2903 |
Figures in parentheses denote standard deviation. Only reporting data from 1991, 1997 and 2006 because these are the baselines and final wave of interest.
§
Among those who participated.
$
More than 12 times in the past year.
¥
CDC, American College of Sports Medicine, and the WHO recommends ≥ 30 minutes/day for any activity (Haskell et al., 2007), but here we limit to only transportation and leisure activities for the China adult population due to high labor and domestic activities.