Ante Sestan1, Ivana Cerkez Zovko2, Damir Sekulic1
1University of Split, Faculty of Kinesiology, Split, Croatia
2University of Mostar, Faculty of Science and Education, Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina
Analysis of the Associations between Physical Literacy and Health Literacy in Older Females; Cross Sectional Study
Sport Mont 2025, 23(2), Ahead of Print | DOI: 10.26773/smj.250603
Abstract
Physical literacy (PL) and health literacy (HL) are important concepts known to be related to health behavior in all age groups, but studies rarely have examined the possible associations between them in older persons. This study aimed to evaluate the associations between HL and PL in older females, emphasizing the associations between specific facets of studied concepts. The participants were females from urban center in southern Croatia (n=45, 60- 80 years of age). They were tested on HL (via the European Health Literacy Survey Questionnaire), and PL (via the Perceived Physical Literacy Questionnaire) in controlled and supervised settings. In addition to total scores (PL-total and HL-total), five subdomains of PL (PL-physical competence, PL-understanding, PL-motivation, PL-confidence, and PL-knowledge) and 12 HL-subscores were observed as variables. There was no correlation between HL-total and PLtotal (Pearson’s R =0.16, p>0.05). Canonical analysis calculated between PL-subdomains and HL-subscores indicated a nonsignificant multivariate association between concepts (Can R =0.67, p>0.05). However, specific domain-level analysis revealed that PL-understanding subdomain was a significant correlate of HL across several subscores, and the HL total. The results suggest that understanding the PL concept may serve as a bridge between PL and HL, potentially being important for promoting autonomy and informed health behavior in older females.
Keywords
physical competence, physical activity, health behavior, adults, correlations
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