Recently in Japan, there are much concern about disturbance of lifestyle habits and decrease of physical activity (PA) among children. Under such circumstances, school recess is an important time zone that children can play independently. The present study was therefore aimed to examine the living factors affecting independent PA in elementary school students during school recess. The study participants were 3rd grade to 6th grade 1,059 children (536 boys and 523 girls) attending 7 elementary schools. Research was conducted between October and November 2015. All the data were collected using an original non-anonymous questionnaire that asked about living conditions, independent PA in recesses, and other issues. As the results, the living and PA conditions of the subjects were mostly general. And, the significant relationships with independent PA in before-class recess were confirmed with “sex” (OR = 2.909, 95%CI = 2.094 - 4.042,) “wake-up time / intermediate group” (OR = 0.526, 95%CI = 0.353 - 0.782,) “wake-up time / late group” (OR = 0.247, 95%CI = 0.167 - 0.365,) “breakfast intake” (OR = 0.472, 95%CI = 0.242 - 0.921,) “screen time / intermediate group” (OR = 0.660, 95%CI = 0.451 - 0.965,) “screen time / long group” (OR = 0.399, 95%CI = 0.270 - 0.591,) “cram school” (OR = 1.713, 95%CI = 1.097 - 2.675,) and “sports lesson” (OR = 1.593, 95%CI = 1.023 - 2.480,) Similarly, “sex” (OR = 2.433, 95%CI = 1.783 - 3.320,) “grade” (OR = 0.699, 95%CI = 0.605 - 0.806,) “wake-up time / late group” (OR = 0.528, 95%CI = 0.369 - 0.756,) and “screen time / long group” (OR = 0.594, 95%CI = 0.409 - 0.863,) in morning recess and “sports lesson” (OR = 0.659, 95%CI = 0.440 - 0.986,) in lunch recess were extracted. From the above findings, we reached the conclusion that practice of sleep improvement and screen time control etc. were the necessary for promote independent PA of children during school recesses.
