The questions:

What are the relationships of (a) engagement in physical activity in general and (b) the special movement education program on psychological well-being? Why (and how) do primary school children take up the opportunity to engage in early physical fitness programs and how do psychological constructs (and measures) best predict overall success and benefit from those programs?

The foundation for behaviours conducive to a healthy adulthood is firmly laid down in childhood and adolescence. It is therefore crucial that the establishment of health promoting behaviours and the encouragement of health risk behaviours is dealt with early in life.

A range of factors bear on the acquisition of health promoting behaviours in childhood. Information on behaviour, risk and health is both widely available and engagingly presented. The readiness and capacity of young people to take this information up and to translate it into health behaviour acquisition or behaviour change is, however, a more difficult issue for health psychologists to deal with. An understanding of this is of clear importance in facilitating the risk-reducing behaviours early in life and of maintaining these through to adulthood.

The early years of life are often portrayed to be carefree but frequently they are not. We are interested in the relationship between physical activity levels and movement education classes with general happiness and personal development of the child.

Measurement areas in this study centre on stress in its various forms, body and personal image, and self-esteem of our children. There is evidence that physical activity and physical education can have a positive influence on these characteristics. We would not only like to explore whether this is indeed true of our children and the specific program but also whether this carries over into later years.

Moreover, the desire for an attractive body image has typically been associated with engagement in health promoting behaviours among adolescents. There is also evidence that those with an already positive body image are more likely than others to maintain health promoting behaviours.

The relationship between physical activity, body image, happiness and health understanding and actual behaviour is one that may prove very fruitful in future preventive medicine.

Research instruments are questionnaires administered to the children, teachers and parents