The Effect of an After-School Physical Activity Program on Children’s Cognitive, Social, and Emotional Health during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Nova Scotia
, Matthew B. Miller 1,3, Constance Tweedie 1, Jeffery B. L. Zahavich 1, Ella Cockett 1 and Laurene Rehman 1,*Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Overview: This is a good study that helps to evaluate BOKS programs and the impact of Covid on physical activity in school age children. More detail is needed in the methods section as well as the discussion.
Abstract: Good summary of problems, methods, findings, conclusions and applications. Easy to understand yet thorough.
Introduction: The introduction is clear and provides context for the issues surrounding mental health in youth in the Atlantic regions of Canada and is very easy to follow and understand. The authors do a good job of connecting existing research in afterschool and outdoor activities with the problems associated with lack of access during Covid. This introduction does a thorough job of setting up the study and context for the study in BOKS programs.
Materials and Methods: Lines 127-128 – Please provide more detail as to what constitutes “full length physical activity plans”. Considering the amount of time spend in the introduction emphasizing physical activity, this description should come with more detail. The same for “movement-based games” -please provide examples or more specific descriptions.
This section should also include more details of the population. There are numbers associated with parents but the age, education/grade, and gender of the actual children need to be added here. Also when the questionnaires were given. While some of this list listed later in the results, it is important to have this here as well as a matter of identifying the target population.
In the Procedures section, please provide some descriptions as to the types of questions that were asked (examples and appendices if needed) in addition to the measurements used for these questions (e.g. Likert). This is especially important since the data is analyzed in SPSS.
Results: While the written results are nice to read, the table format is much better for this study and the authors did a good job of plotting out the results in an accessible way.
Discussion: Please provide some context as to what constitutes “physical activity” with regards to the questionnaire according to parent analysis and how that compares to BOKS programs’ definition of physical activity.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
Thank you for taking the time to review our manuscript and provide such helpful feedback. We hope we have addressed your comments appropriately. Please see our point-by-point response below.
Sincerely,
Hilary Caldwell
Overview: This is a good study that helps to evaluate BOKS programs and the impact of Covid on physical activity in school age children. More detail is needed in the methods section as well as the discussion.
Thank you for taking the time to review our manuscript. We have addressed all comments, particularly the additional details in the methods and discussion sections, and hope our responses are to your satisfaction.
Abstract: Good summary of problems, methods, findings, conclusions and applications. Easy to understand yet thorough.
Thank you for the positive feedback on the abstract.
Introduction: The introduction is clear and provides context for the issues surrounding mental health in youth in the Atlantic regions of Canada and is very easy to follow and understand. The authors do a good job of connecting existing research in afterschool and outdoor activities with the problems associated with lack of access during Covid. This introduction does a thorough job of setting up the study and context for the study in BOKS programs.
Thank you for the positive feedback on the introduction.
Materials and Methods: Lines 127-128 – Please provide more detail as to what constitutes “full length physical activity plans”. Considering the amount of time spend in the introduction emphasizing physical activity, this description should come with more detail. The same for “movement-based games” -please provide examples or more specific descriptions.
Thank you for this feedback. We have now added more details about the “full length physical activity plans” and “movement-based games”, as well as a link to the BOKS website for additional information. Please see lines: 129-136.
This section should also include more details of the population. There are numbers associated with parents but the age, education/grade, and gender of the actual children need to be added here. Also when the questionnaires were given. While some of this list listed later in the results, it is important to have this here as well as a matter of identifying the target population.
Thank you for this comment. We have now added the target population to the Procedures section: ”Parents of students of all genders in grades 3, 4, 5 and 6 who were enrolled in the Excel after-school program were recruited to participate in this study” (lines 140-142), and lines 141 and 144-145.
In the Procedures section, please provide some descriptions as to the types of questions that were asked (examples and appendices if needed) in addition to the measurements used for these questions (e.g. Likert). This is especially important since the data is analyzed in SPSS.
We have now added additional details to the Procedures section about the questionnaires used (lines 151-159).
Results: While the written results are nice to read, the table format is much better for this study and the authors did a good job of plotting out the results in an accessible way.
Thank you. We are glad you found the presentation of results accessible and clear.
Discussion: Please provide some context as to what constitutes “physical activity” with regards to the questionnaire according to parent analysis and how that compares to BOKS programs’ definition of physical activity.
We have now added additional information about our physical activity measure to the methods section (lines 155-158), clarified our meaning in the discussion (lines 234-236), and addressing the difference between our definitions as a limitation of our study (lines 274-276).
Reviewer 2 Report
The paper “The effect of an after school physical activity program on children’s cognitive, social, and emotional health during the 3 COVID-19 pandemic in Nova Scotia” examines the effectiveness of the BOKS program in protecting children from the psychological and behavioral effects of the COVID pandemic. To this aim the authors collected PROMIS questionnaire data from the children's parents at baseline and follow-up. The study is sound and timely.
(1) Considering the manuscript's focus on the COVID pandemic's effects, it would be informative to know when the baseline and follow-up measures occurred.
(2) There might be room for improving the discussion in order to better highlight the impact of the study within a consolidated and broader framework. For instance, it has been shown that the psychological effects of the COVID pandemic depends also on personality traits, alexithymia, and resilience (Osimo et al. 2021, Frontiers in Psychology) and is correlated with behavioral wellbeing such as emotional eating (Cecchetto et al. 2021, Appetite). Linking these previous studies to the present one could provide new perspectives on how to further ameliorate COVID-related assessments, e.g. taking into account the relationship between BOKS' benefits, personality traits, and behavioral wellbeing.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
Thank you for taking the time to review our manuscript and provide such helpful feedback. We hope we have addressed your comments appropriately. Please see our point-by-point response below.
Sincerely,
Hilary Caldwell
The paper “The effect of an after school physical activity program on children’s cognitive, social, and emotional health during the 3 COVID-19 pandemic in Nova Scotia” examines the effectiveness of the BOKS program in protecting children from the psychological and behavioral effects of the COVID pandemic. To this aim the authors collected PROMIS questionnaire data from the children's parents at baseline and follow-up. The study is sound and timely.
Thank you for the positive review of our manuscript. We hope we have addressed all comments appropriately.
- Considering the manuscript's focus on the COVID pandemic's effects, it would be informative to know when the baseline and follow-up measures occurred.
Thank you for this comment. The survey dates of October and December 2020 have now been added to the Procedures paragraph of the Material and Methods section (lines 141-142 and 144-145).
- There might be room for improving the discussion in order to better highlight the impact of the study within a consolidated and broader framework. For instance, it has been shown that the psychological effects of the COVID pandemic depends also on personality traits, alexithymia, and resilience (Osimo et al. 2021, Frontiers in Psychology) and is correlated with behavioral wellbeing such as emotional eating (Cecchetto et al. 2021, Appetite). Linking these previous studies to the present one could provide new perspectives on how to further ameliorate COVID-related assessments, e.g. taking into account the relationship between BOKS' benefits, personality traits, and behavioral wellbeing.
This is a wonderful suggestion, thank you. We have now reviewed these references and added additional comments about the impact of the pandemic on psychological stress and how physical activity may be an appropriate strategy to address stress during lockdowns and periods of severe public health restrictions.
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
comments addressed
