Progettazione e valutazione di un percorso educativo personalizzato per la promozione dell'attivita' fisica tra gli studenti universitari

Taking part in an adequate level of physical activity represents a very important behaviour for the maintaining and the improvement of people's health. For this reason, among others, physical education is present in schools curricula worldwide, with the aim to help young people to value the importance of an active lifestyle. Nevertheless, in the transition from high school to university, a decrease in physical activity has been often been observed. Moreover, there are young people that are physically inactive during high school, and these are more at risk for a sedentary behaviour during the university years. It can be useful, for the end of improving the health and the wellbeing of university students, to implement interventions for the promotion of physical activity. The present dissertation describes the planning and the evaluation of an educational program to promote the adoption and the maintaining of a physically active lifestyle among university students. The aim is to provide a project for the creation of a service for the promotion of physical activity offered by the university to the students. The dissertation is composed by three main parts, related one each other, but that also represent partly independents researches: 1) A systematic review of the literature regarding controlled trials of interventions aimed at promoting physical activity among university students. In this part of the dissertation, the literature will be critically analysed, to search for strategies that have proved to be effective in promoting physical activity among university students. 2) An explorative survey among the students of the University of Padua. The survey has been carried out to investigate the phenomenon of physical inactivity among the students of the University of Padua, and to analyse the main perceived barriers to physical activity. 3) The planning and e valuation, by means of a pilot study, of a personalised educational intervention for the promotion of physical activity among university students. The planning of the intervention is preceded by the exposition of the anthropological and the pedagogical theoretical frameworks adopted.