Participatory Survey Development to Examine the Role of the Social and Physical Environment in Physical Activity

Population-based surveys are often recommended to provide data to guide intervention planning and evalute impact. Traditional survey research methods have involved investigator-driven survey development based on hypothesized or previously developed models that describe relationships among key predictors and outcome variables of interest. Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) methods have gained increasing recognition for their ability to incorporate community expertise in the development of culturally appropriate and context-specific interventions. CBPR approaches require the involvement of community and academic partners in all phases of the research, including the development of data collection instruments. Funding and publishing, key elements of effective intervention planning and dissemination; require certain scientific standards that may seem to preclude community involvement in survey design. This paper describes a participatory process through which community representatives were involved in building a model that guided survey development for data collection in an intervention to increase physical activity through changes in the social and physical environment. A series of questions were posed in an interactive exercise with community leaders (residents of the intervention neighborhood) to elicit dimensions of physical activity, facilitators, barriers, and potential strategies for increasing activity. Resulting themes were used to guide questionnaire development and the sequencing of factors in the model. The resulting survey is grounded in community realities, yet similar to empirical models developed to assess the role of environment in other health issues (e.g., diet). Data gathered using the survey instrument have desired psychometric properties and the ability to both guide and evaluate intervention strategies.