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Questionnaire development: Questionnaire contents

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Questionnaire contents

The questionnaire was designed to capture activity levels as defined by CMO guidelines1. From this, three levels of activity have been defined:

  • Active: at least 150 minutes per week of moderate-intensity activity in bouts of 10 minutes or more spread over several days. Periods of vigorous activity are counted as double.
  • Fairly active: 30 – 149 minutes per week of moderate-intensity activity in bouts of 10 minutes or more spread over several days. Periods of vigorous activity are counted as double.
  • Inactive: less than 30 minutes per week of moderate-intensity activity in bouts of 10 minutes or more spread over several days. Periods of vigorous activity are counted as double.

The questionnaire has evolved over time to reflect the latest strategy aims of the Government and Sport England.

The Government’s current ‘Get Active’2 strategy includes a number of targets in relation to physical activity.

The Active Lives survey will be used to monitor progress against the headline national ambitions, as well as the specific targets to tackle disparities in participation rates.

The table below shows the targets which will be assessed using Active Lives survey data.

  • Activity targets measured by the Active Lives survey

    Get Active target
    • Over 2.5 million more active adults as defined through the Chief Medical Officers’ guidelines on physical activity
    • 1.4 million more active adults from those in NS-SEC 6-8 (see terminology)
    • 0.7 million more active people who identify as having 1 or more disabilities
    • 1.5 million more active adults aged 55+
    • 1.25 million more active women
    • 0.19 million more active Asian adults, particularly people from Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi ethnic groups
    • 0.09 million more active Black adults
    • Increase activity rates in all parts of the country
    • Decrease inactivity rates in all parts of the country.

    Sport England has a responsibility to collect data on participation in specific sports and disciplines, not just overall participation in activity.

    To produce data for these measures, the questionnaire needed to ask questions to capture information on:

    • which activities people take part in
    • how often they take part
    • how long they take part for each time, and
    • the intensity of the activity.

    In addition, Sport England needed information on the settings in which people take part in activities, particularly outdoor settings as participating in sport and activity in the natural environment is a key element of Sporting Future.

    There was a desire for questions on membership of clubs, attitudes to sport and activity, the extent to which people have physical activity as a habit and readiness to participate (for those who are less active).

    New questions were added after Year 1 fieldwork had started to collect data on the strategy outcomes, which include ONS wellbeing, individual development and community trust.

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  • Wellbeing outcomes

    Outcome Summary definition Reported by
    2 Mental wellbeing Mean score out of 10 for subjective wellbeing as measured by the ONS wellbeing questions
    3 Individual development Mean score out of 5 for their perception of their ability to achieve goals and to keep trying when finding something difficult
    4 Social/community development Mean score out of 5 for trusting others in the local area and mean score out of 4 for agreeing people in their local area get on well together

    Key demographic information was needed, such as age, sex, ethnicity, disability, socio-economic status, education level.

    The survey was also being used to gather data on other health measures, including obesity and fruit and vegetable consumption, for the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID).

    During the original design phase at Year 1, questions from other surveys, including the previous Active People survey, the Health Survey for England and IPAQ (International Physical Activity Questionnaires) were considered.

    Active Lives was a new survey with a different methodology and intended to measure different outcomes from those in the Active People survey.

    Nonetheless, it was important that data could be reproduced on some of the key measures (e.g. overall participation, participation in swimming, running, football and other key activities).

    A draft questionnaire was produced through collaboration between Ipsos and Sport England, with Sport England focussing on the requirements in terms of their data needs and Ipsos focussing on questionnaire design issues.

    Sport England also commissioned SIRC (Social Issues Research Centre) to conduct a review of volunteering and club membership literature and existing questions.

    Alongside the SIRC review, focus groups were carried out to understand how people describe their motivations and habits in relation to sports and physical activity to ensure that the resulting questions correspond to the way in which people think about these issues.

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1 CMO guidelines have subsequently been revised to remove the requirement for bouts of activity to last at least 10 minutes or more. This condition has been kept in Active Lives survey definitions, however, to allow for comparability across years.

2 Get Active strategy

Previous section: 2a Next section: Continue to 2c

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