Assessment of difference in physical activities in urban and rural adolescents of Mangalore

Background: The increasing prevalence of adolescents who are overweight is one of the most pressing public health problems in India. Aims & Objectives: To find the difference in Physical Activities(PA) among urban adolescents to that of rural in Mangalore. Materials and Methods: Cross sectional study among high school students using a standard questionnaire (PAQ-A) to elicit total hours of PA during the past seven days. Results: Average age of the adolescents was 13.9. We could find 56% boys and 44% girls studying in urban schools and 53.3% boys and 46.6 % girls in rural. Seventy seven percent of the total students do running/jogging as their major PA and 66.6% students do cycling. Only 32.8% students had PA while coming to school every day and it was most common among boys in rural schools (55%). Total PA Score for rural areas was 453.5 with a mean of 3.06(out of 5). For Urban areas, total score was 376.3 with a mean of 2.5 and the difference in proportion was statistically significant. Conclusion: We found that the adolescents studying in the schools of rural areas had better physical activities compared to their urban school counterparts

Assessment of Smartphone Addiction among adolescents in a University

Introduction: A smartphone is a combination of cellphone and handheld computers that created the greatest tech revolution since the Internet. The official name for smartphone addiction is Nomophobia which is defined as having a fear of not being with your phone. Objective: To assess the smartphone addiction among adolescents and its association with socio demographic factors. Methodology: A cross sectional study among adolescents in a university in Mangalore among students <19yrs of age. Sample size was estimated using the prevalence formula, taking prevalence as 50% and allowable error of 5%. A validated, self-administered questionnaire was used for assessment. Proportion for addiction and Chi Square analysis was done. Results: A total of 426 students were enrolled for the study. The prevalence of smartphone addiction was 57% in the study population, females had higher addiction scores than males. There was significant association of family annual income, monthly pocket money and occupation of the father with smartphone addiction. Conclusion: The prevalence of smartphone addiction among adolescents is high. The results of our study showed that smartphone addiction is more prevalent in the families with higher economic status