Using Television-Viewing Hours and Total Hours Sitting as Interchangeable Measures of Sedentary Behavior

Abstract

Sedentary behaviors, activities spent sitting, or lying down during waking hours, are of significant public health importance. Television-viewing (TV-viewing) hours and total hours sitting are common self-report measures of sedentary behaviors. Given the widespread usage of these measures, the study purpose was to measure the concordance between TV-viewing hours and total hours sitting to determine whether they can be used as interchangeable measures of time spent in sedentary behavior. Using a sample (n = 2687) of workers from a group-randomized control trial, the current study assessed the concordance between weekday total hours sitting and TV-viewing hours. Tertiles were created based on the distribution of total hours sitting and TV-viewing hours. Weighted Kappa (Kappaw) statistics were calculated for the full sample and subgroups. Half of the sample reported 2 to 3 daily hours of TV-viewing hours and the most reported total hours sitting was 8 hours (14%). Kappaw statistics for tertiles of total hours sitting and TV-viewing hours were 0.005 (95% CI = −0.02 to 0.03), indicating little agreement. Kappaw statistics for subgroup analyses (body mass index categories, gender, and intervention assignment) showed poor agreement. Results do not support the use of total hours sitting and TV-viewing hours as interchangeable measures of sedentary behavior.