The Council on Environment and Physical Activity (CEPA) is one of the five Founding Councils of the International Society of Physical Activity and Health (ISPAH).
The Council on Environment and Physical Activity supports investigators from multiple disciplines around the world to conduct rigorous research on physical activity and the environment and the use of results to advocate for evidence-based environmental and policy changes to support and promote physical activity internationally.
Hundreds of scientific studies document the relation of built and social environment variables to physical activity in all age groups. National and international plans for promoting physical activity and reducing obesity stress the necessity of changing environments and policies as part of multi-‐level intervention strategies (individual, social, organizational, environmental, and policy levels). Policies drive environmental changes, so the two are linked. Strategies need to be evidence-‐based and environmental correlates of physical activity across different countries, cultures, and population subgroups are not well documented. Thus, an increased emphasis on international environment and physical activity research is needed.
Our international group recognized this need several years ago and developed IPEN (International Physical Activity and Environment Network) to help build capacity for investigators in many countries to conduct this new type of physical activity research. We have promoted the use of common measures so results are more comparable across countries. IPEN has assisted investigators in at least 12 countries obtain funded studies based on similar measures and designs. We are in the second year of an NIH-‐funded project to pool the results from these studies for an international analysis.
- Stimulate and support research on physical activity and the environment internationally
- Build capacity to use the best available methods, and encourage the use of common protocols and measures
- Increase communication and collaboration among researchers to develop new measures, adapt measures for local contexts, and organize networks focusing on specific population subgroups, geographic regions, and research questions
- Encourage formation of interdisciplinary teams to conduct research
- Encourage teams from different countries to conduct joint and pooled studies, with the aim of identifying unique environmental and cultural determinants of physical activity
- Support investigators and practitioners to become effective advocates for evidence--‐based environmental and policy change.
The purpose of CEPA is to support investigators from multiple disciplines around the world to conduct rigorous research on physical activity and the environment and use the results to advocate for evidence-based environmental and policy changes to support and promote physical activity internationally.
Chair: James Sallis (San Diego State University, USA)
Vice Chair: Neville Owen (University of Queensland, Australia)
Secretary: Ilse de Bourdeaudhuij (Gent University, Belgium)
Communication Officer: Jacqueline Kerr (University of California, San Diego, USA)
Working Group Coordinator: Takemi Sugiyama (University of Queensland, Australia)
