Table 2. Descriptive characteristics of participants stratified by study site in the International Study of Childhood Obesity, Lifestyle and the Environment (ISCOLE).
| Australia (Adelaide) | Brazil (São Paulo) | Canada (Ottawa) | China (Tianjin) | Colombia (Bogota) | Finland (Helsinki, Espoo and Vantaa) | India (Bangalore) | Kenya (Nairobi) | Portugal (Porto) | South Africa (Cape Town) | UK (Bath and North East Somerset) | USA (Baton Rouge) | Total | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| n=512 | n=498 | n=559 | n=544 | n=911 | n=496 | n=600 | n=552 | n=672 | n=437 | n=469 | n=622 | n=6872 | |
| Socio-demographic characteristics | |||||||||||||
| World bank classificationa | High income | Upper-middle income | High income | Upper-middle income | Upper-middle income | High income | Lower-middle income | Low income | High income | Upper-middle income | High income | High income | NA |
| Gini indexb | 35.2 (1994) | 54.7 (2009) | 32.6 (2000) | 42.6 (2002) | 55.9 (2010) | 26.9 (2000) | 33.4 (2005) | 47.7 (2005) | 38.5 (1997) | 63.1 (2009) | 36.0 (1999) | 40.8 (2000) | NA |
| Motor vehicles per 1000 inhabitantsc | 687 | 198 | 605 | 37 | 58 | 534 | 15 | 21 | 509 | 159 | 526 | 809 | NA |
| Estimated road traffic death rate per 100 000 inhabitantsd | 6.1 | 22.5 | 6.8 | 20.5 | 15.6 | 5.1 | 18.9 | 20.9 | 11.8 | 31.9 | 3.7 | 11.4 | NA |
| Agee | 10.8 (0.4) | 10.5 (0.5) | 10.5 (0.4) | 9.9 (0.5) | 10.4 (0.6) | 10.4 (0.4) | 10.4 (0.5) | 10.2 (0.7) | 10.4 (0.3) | 10.2 (0.7) | 10.9 (0.5) | 10.0 (0.6) | 10.4 (0.6) |
| Gender | |||||||||||||
| Male | 45.9 | 48.0 | 41.9 | 53.1 | 49.3 | 46.8 | 47.0 | 46.4 | 44.0 | 42.3 | 43.9 | 43.1 | 46.1 |
| Female | 54.1 | 52.0 | 58.1 | 46.9 | 50.7 | 53.2 | 53.0 | 53.6 | 56.0 | 57.7 | 56.1 | 56.9 | 53.9 |
| Highest parent education | |||||||||||||
| <High School | 11.3 | 24.3 | 2.0 | 32.9 | 31.5 | 2.8 | 4.7 | 14.1 | 46.6 | 47.1 | 2.8 | 8.5 | 19.8 |
| Complete high school or some college | 47.9 | 53.2 | 27.7 | 44.7 | 50.9 | 55.2 | 21.8 | 45.1 | 32.9 | 39.8 | 51.8 | 44.1 | 42.8 |
| ⩾Bachelor degree | 40.8 | 22.5 | 70.3 | 22.4 | 17.6 | 41.9 | 73.5 | 40.8 | 20.5 | 13.0 | 45.4 | 47.4 | 37.4 |
| Motorized vehicle ownership | |||||||||||||
| None | 2.3 | 30.1 | 3.8 | 9.7 | 75.5 | 9.9 | 4.3 | 44.2 | 10.7 | 47.6 | 4.3 | 8.4 | 23.2 |
| 1 | 22.5 | 47.8 | 38.3 | 44.1 | 21.6 | 45.0 | 32.5 | 33.3 | 42.4 | 27 | 36.2 | 32.0 | 34.6 |
| 2 or more | 75.2 | 22.1 | 58.0 | 46.1 | 2.9 | 45.2 | 63.2 | 22.5 | 46.9 | 25.4 | 59.5 | 59.6 | 42.2 |
| Number of siblings | |||||||||||||
| None | 6.8 | 19.6 | 11.3 | 67.9 | 7.8 | 14.7 | 23.0 | 9.4 | 27.7 | 5.8 | 11.1 | 10.0 | 18.0 |
| 1 | 44.2 | 42.3 | 51.5 | 28.0 | 33.8 | 38.8 | 64.8 | 27.8 | 53.0 | 37.6 | 45.0 | 29.1 | 41.2 |
| 2 or more | 49.0 | 38.1 | 37.2 | 4.1 | 58.4 | 46.6 | 12.2 | 62.9 | 19.3 | 56.6 | 43.9 | 60.8 | 40.8 |
| School transport characteristics | |||||||||||||
| School travel mode | |||||||||||||
| Active | |||||||||||||
| Walking | 24.1 | 39.0 | 34.2 | 22.2 | 71.6 | 54.8 | 3.8 | 40.9 | 27.1 | 57.9 | 50.3 | 9.8 | 36.9 |
| Bicycle, rollerblade, skateboard, scooter | 7.2 | 1.0 | 0.7 | 10.1 | 1.8 | 24.4 | 1.3 | 2.9 | 1.0 | 0.9 | 12.2 | 0.5 | 4.9 |
| Motorized | |||||||||||||
| Bus, train, tram, underground or boat | 4.5 | 32.3 | 38.3 | 7.5 | 18.4 | 13.1 | 61.8 | 27.9 | 12.1 | 4.8 | 3.2 | 34.8 | 22.2 |
| Car, motorcycle or moped | 63.8 | 26.7 | 26.5 | 55.1 | 7.5 | 7.5 | 33.0 | 23.6 | 58.9 | 36.3 | 33.9 | 54.3 | 34.8 |
| Otherf | 0.4 | 1.0 | 0.4 | 5.0 | 0.8 | 0.2 | 0.0 | 4.7 | 0.9 | 0.0 | 0.4 | 0.7 | 1.2 |
| Travel time | |||||||||||||
| ⩽15 min | 85.2 | 68.7 | 74.8 | 65.6 | 61.7 | 79.0 | 37.2 | 56.5 | 84.1 | 70.7 | 79.5 | 70.3 | 68.8 |
| ⩾16 min | 14.8 | 31.3 | 25.2 | 34.4 | 38.3 | 21.0 | 62.8 | 43.5 | 15.9 | 29.3 | 20.5 | 29.7 | 31.2 |
| School-level ICC for school travel modeg | 0.18 | 0.25 | 0.31 | 0.09 | 0.56 | 0.24 | 0.00 | 0.38 | 0.11 | 0.55 | 0.10 | 0.27 | NA |
Abbreviations: ICC, intra-class correlation coefficient; ISCOLE, International Study of Childhood Obesity, Lifestyle and the Environment, NA, not applicable.
a
World Bank Data at country level: World Development Indicators 2012. The World Bank: Washington, DC; 2012.
b
World Bank Data: Gini index at country level.
c
World Bank Data at country level: motor vehicles (per 1000 people) include cars, buses and freight vehicles but not two-wheelers.
d
World Health Organization data: Global status report on road safety 2013.
e
Mean and s.d.
f
Other includes school van, matatu, bus feeder, riding on the top tube of the bike's frame, pedicab and wheelchair.
g
ICC calculated in an ‘empty' model with only school entered as a random effect (Cerin, 2011).