The relationship between children's active play imagery and basic psychological needs

Abstract

Research has shown that children's physical activity levels are decreasing, with only 7% of Canadian children meeting the required daily physical activity levels (Active Healthy Kids, 2011). Given imagery use in adult exercisers has been linked to exercise motivation (Wilson et al., 2003) the same may be true for children and active play. This study examined whether the three types of active play imagery (fun, capability, and social) were related to the three basic psychological needs (autonomy, competence, and relatedness) postulated by self-determination theory. A total of 253 children (118 males; 134 females; 1 missing) aged 7-14 years old (M_age=10.35,SD=2.26) completed the Children's Active Play Imagery Questionnaire (CAPIQ; Cooke, Munroe-Chandler, & Hall, 2012) and the Basic Needs Questionnaire for Children (BNQ-C; Gray, Prapavessis, & McGowan, 2009). Structural equation modeling was used to analyze the hypothetical model. It was hypothesized that fun imagery would be related to the need for autonomy, capability to competence, and social to relatedness. The chi square value was 5.622, p < .05 and the fit indices of this model were acceptable: CFI =.998; NFI= .982; RMSEA= .022; SRMR= .043. Furthermore, the three types of active play imagery predicted two of the basic psychological needs, competence and relatedness. The results from this study demonstrate the potential for establishing imagery interventions aimed at increasing children's physical activity levels.

Acknowledgments: This research was funded by the Social Science and Humanities Research Council