Active Games: Increasing the Attractiveness of Active Video Game Play for Youth

Child obesity is increasing worldwide and has major implications for health, both during
youth and later in life. Physical activity declines sharply during adolescence, making ages
8-12 a critical period to encourage healthy exercise habits. Increased childhood weight has
been linked to sedentary leisure time activities, such as video games. "Active video games"
(AVGs) are now being studied as a method to increase children's interest and participation in
physical activity. Although research indicates that AVG play may lead to energy expenditure
comparable to light/ moderate physical activity, children prefer sedentary video games to
AVGs and often find AVGs boring. Children do not play AVGs as often or with the same
intensity as traditional games/sports and lose interest in them; efforts must be made to
increase the appeal of AVGs so they are competitive with sedentary video games. This study
will examine whether children's motivation to engage in AVG play may be increased with
greater autonomy, as well as whether increasing children's motivation to play AVGs also
increases their motivation to play sedentary video games.

Inclusion Criteria:

- Sedentary lifestyle

- BMI between 5th and 95th percentile

Exclusion Criteria:

- taking any medications that affect energy use or eating

- actively trying to lose weight

- has any medical conditions that prevent him/her from safely joining in physical
activity

- exercises more than three times per week for one hour at a time

- does not engage in more than 14 hours per week of screen-based activities

- does not own an active video game system

- plays active video games more than 30 minutes per week