ORIGINAL PAPER
Factors increasing the risk of inactivity among administrative, technical, and manual workers in Warszawa public institutions
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Warsaw School of Economics, Warszawa, Poland
(Collegium of World Economy, Department of Tourism)
Corresponding author
Elżbieta Biernat
Warsaw School of Economics Collegium of World Economy, Department of Tourism, Al. Niepodleglości 162, 02-554 Warszawa,
Poland
Int J Occup Med Environ Health. 2015;28(2):283-94
KEYWORDS
ABSTRACT
Objectives: The research aims to assess the level of physical activity among administrative, technical, and manual workers
employed in Warszawa public institutions and to analyze the factors that increase the risk of failing to meet World Health
Organization (WHO) recommendations. Material and Methods: The study comprised 373 employees of randomly selected
institutions. A short version of International Physical Activity Questionnaire (IPAQ) was applied. The correlation between
the mean values of duration, days, MET-min/week of efforts, gender, and type of work was analyzed using the Tukey’s honest
significant difference (HSD) test, while the correlation between the level of physical activity and the socio-demographic
characteristics was assessed with the Chi2 test. The strength of the relationship between socio-demographic characteristics
and fulfilment of WHO standards was expressed by the odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (95% CI). The significance
level was p = 0.05. Results: High levels of physical activity were declared by 41.8% of the manual workers, 14.7% of
the administration staff, and 7.3% of the technicians; 19%, 31.5% and 54.5%, respectively, reported low levels of physical
activity. Factors determining the fulfilment of the WHO recommendations include: the nature of work (p = 0.003),
education (p = 0.004), and income (p = 0.003). The risk of being inactive nearly doubles in the case of administration
staff (31.5%) and increases more than 4 times in the case of technicians (54.5%). Respondents with secondary school
education (31.6%) are exposed to a 3-fold higher risk of inactivity, while in respondents with higher education (37.2%), the
level of the risk is 4-fold higher. Compared to those in the highest income group (23.4%), people who earn less (34.1%) are inactive almost twice as often. Conclusions: Urgent intervention is necessary in all studied groups: increased energy
expenditure for recreation and locomotion, educational offers of employers to promote healthy lifestyle, management of
leisure time budget, and strategies for changing behavior.