A cross-sectional study of Canadian children's valuation of literacies across social contexts

**Background:** Regular movement during childhood is linked to positive physical, mental, and social health outcomes, yet children's physical activity levels remain low. Physical literacy frameworks emphasize motivation, confidence, and subjective task value as drivers of sustained activity participation. Previous research on subjective task value has focused on academic subjects and sports, often limited to the school context. This study aimed to examine how children value reading/writing, math, and movement across three social contexts (school, home, with friends), and to explore sex and age differences in these valuations.

**Methods:** This cross-sectional study used data from the first year (2016) of a longitudinal study of physical literacy in Canadian children and youth. The sample included 7,845 individuals aged 6–13 years (mean age 9.20, SD 1.85) from three Canadian provinces, with approximately equal proportions of males (51.3%) and females (48.7%). Participants completed the PLAYself tool during the school day. The valuing literacies subscale asked children to rate agreement with statements that reading/writing, math, and movement are "very important" in school, at home with family, and with friends, on a 4-point ordinal scale (0–3) rescored to 0–2 per prior validation work. One-way Kruskal-Wallis ANOVAs with post-hoc Wilcoxon rank sum tests were used to compare valuations between contexts and between literacies. Sex differences were assessed using Wilcoxon rank sum tests, and age-related variation was examined using ordinal regression. Effect sizes were reported as Cohen's d.

**Key Results:** Large effect sizes were found for reductions in valuations of reading/writing (d = 1.16) and math (d = 1.33) from school to home to friend contexts. In contrast, movement valuations showed only a small effect across contexts (d = 0.26). Within the friend context, there were significant and substantial differences between literacies (p < 0.001, d = 1.03), with movement valued highest and reading/writing and math devalued or neutrally valued. Sex-dependent effect sizes were minimal (d = 0.05–0.11). Females valued reading/writing and math more than males in school and at home, and valued reading/writing more with friends. No sex differences were found for movement valuation in school or at home, but males valued movement more than females when with friends (d = 0.11). Age gradients showed that valuations of all three literacies increased with age in the school setting; at home, valuations of math and movement (but not reading/writing) increased with age; and only movement valuations increased with age in the friend context.

**Clinical Implications:** The consistent high valuation of movement across social contexts suggests that movement-based programming should be prioritized across school, home, and friend settings to align with children's values and potentially support their agency for health and well-being. The substantial devaluation of reading/writing and math in the friend context highlights an opportunity to integrate movement with academic learning, particularly through physically active classrooms and movement-infused lessons. The finding that sex differences in movement valuation only emerge in the friend context (where males value movement more than females) suggests that interventions targeting movement with friends may need to address societal gender biases and create inclusive opportunities. Physical education teachers and community organizations can help emphasize movement's importance for all children, particularly through novel, non-gendered activities and female-oriented social programming. Limitations include the use of single-item questions from a physical literacy measure rather than a validated subjective task value scale, data collected only in 2016, and lack of detailed demographic information.