CANBERRA, Dec. 12 (Xinhua) -- Australian children cannot jump as far as their parents as the rate of physical activity declines, researchers have found.
The study, published by Active Healthy Kids Australia (AKHA) at the University of South Australia (UniSA) on Wednesday, found that children were not engaging in the same activities as previous generations such as climbing trees and skipping ropes.
As a result, the researchers found that the length of long jumps for boys aged 9-11 years has declined by 4,5 centimeters (cm) in 30 years, while that of boys aged 12-15 declined 7.6cm.
Meanwhile, the average length of a long jump by girls aged 9-11 decreased by 8.5cm and by 9.3cm for those aged 12-15.
"We know that over the last 30 years ... muscular fitness, specifically looking at muscular power and standing long jump has declined, so kids today aren't as muscularly fit as say, their parents were," Natasha Schranz, lead author of the study and AHKA co-chair, told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) on Wednesday.
"Muscular fitness, irrespective of aerobic fitness, is really important for health and wellbeing but also, we know that then helps continue an active lifestyle across the lifespan too."
Schranz said that the findings of her own study could be linked to those of a study by Sydney's Macquarie University and the University of Amsterdam, which in 2017 found that overprotective parents were causing children to be more anxious.
"We know that most Aussie kids aren't getting the 60 minutes of huff and puff activity (and are not doing) muscle and bone strengthening activities at least three days a week," she said.
"We don't see as many kids climbing trees or hanging on the monkey bars and that is a vicious cycle.
"Their strength declines, and then they don't feel like they can do other things as well some other kids so they tend not to do them anymore."
