Marquet et al. BMC Geriatrics (2020) 20:134 https://doi.org/10.1186/s12877-020-01527-6 RESEARCH ARTICLE Open Access Physical activity benefits of attending a senior center depend largely on age and gender: a study using GPS and accelerometry data Oriol Marquet1,2*, Monika Maciejewska2, Xavier Delclòs-Alió2, Guillem Vich2, Jasper Schipperijn3 and Carme Miralles-Guasch2 Abstract Background: Senior centers offer important opportunities for physical activity and social interaction. Seniors who visit a senior center regularly can gain physical activity from transportation and from specific activities offered within the senior center. However, there is very little knowledge regarding the specific physical activity gains obtained from regular visits to senior centers, and no effort has been made to use device-based measures of physical activity to test the potential physical activity benefits of attending a senior center. Methods: To fill this gap, the present study examined the physical activity patterns of 227 seniors living in the Barcelona Metropolitan Area in Spain. Using GPS and Accelerometer 7-day tracking data, and GIS measures we assessed the light physical activity and moderate-to-vigorous intensity physical activity (MVPA) benefits of attending the senior center on a weekly and daily basis. Results: Seniors who attended a senior center at least once a week did not accumulate significantly more daily physical activity (211.6 min; 95% CI 196.6; 226.6) than seniors without any visit 215.9 min; 95% CI 202.7; 229). However, on a day-to-day basis, it was found that visiting a senior center had positive effects in physical activity and was associated with less sedentary time among younger participants in general (− 18.2 daily min 95% CI − 33.2;-3.3 p = 0.016) and among older female participants in particular (− 19.7 daily min 95% CI -21.06;-18.5 p = 0.011). Conclusions: The benefits of attending senior centers in terms of physical activity should not be viewed as universal, but rather as contingent to the demographics of the user, and the type of activity that the visit is replacing. Keywords: Senior center, Accelerometry, Physical activity, MVPA, GPS tracking Background prevent falls and also provide access to opportunities Physical activity is a key part of active aging and the as- that help personal independence [1]. Physical activity sociation between exercise and physical health is well (PA) is considered a key part of maintaining quality of established. Exercise at advanced ages is important to life and successful aging [2] as there is abundant evi- maintain physical fitness, and it can promote mobility, dence that individuals who engage in higher levels of PA tend to have higher health-related quality of life * Correspondence: oriol.marquet@isglobal.org (HRQoL) scores [3], and better physical health [4–6]. 1 IS Global (Barcelona Institute for Global Health), Barcelona, Spain Senior centers, also commonly known as elderly cen- 2 Geography Department, Autonomous University of Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain ters or seniors’ clubs, offer a wide variety of programs Full list of author information is available at the end of the article © The Author(s). 2020 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data. Marquet et al. BMC Geriatrics (2020) 20:134 Page 2 of 10 and services. By offering opportunities for social inter- Similarly, a large amount of literature has been de- action and friendship, senior centers have traditionally voted to the determinants of senior center attendance had a central role in easing loneliness, increasing so- [28, 29] and some studies have reported female seniors cial integration and reducing isolation [7–9]. In the to use these centers more often than male seniors [7, case of senior centers in Spain, these public facilities 30], while others have found no significant relationship offer a range of free activities provided by health care between gender and senior center attendance [31, 32]. professionals that can range from knitting classes, for- As demonstrated by two recent reviews, the existing mal or informal board games such as playing cards, literature has mainly focused on what happens inside the dominoes or chess, to organized physical activity clas- senior center but there is a lack of information about se- ses such as yoga, Zumba or aerobics. These physical niors’ lives beyond the center [33] and more research on activity classes are adapted to seniors and tailored to the individual effects of senior center attendance is improve and maintain their physical capacity while needed [34]. With the notable exception of Turner et al. also providing fun and attractive environments. In re- [35], who used pedometers to measure seniors’ weekly cent years, with the rise in popularity of concepts physical activity, to our knowledge no other study has such as active aging and aging in place, the role of used a device-based measurement of physical activity. senior centers as providers and promoters of physical Similarly, to date no study has attempted to analyze how activity has gained relevance. In the context of walkable senior center attendance is changing the physical activity and accessible urban environments [10, 11], senior centers of seniors with no specific participation in programs or can act as mediators of active and successful aging [12]. activities. However, there is an important lack of research devoted To fill the prominent research gaps noted in the above, to measuring and objectively assessing the physical activity we aimed at measuring the physical activity benefits of that seniors gain from their visits to senior centers. visiting a senior center using GPS and Accelerometer 7- Previous research on senior centers and physical activ- day tracking data for 227 seniors in the Metropolitan ity has focused on evaluating how the change in a spe- Region of Barcelona, Spain. Our goal was to measure 1) cific program available in senior centers can increase the the weekly physical activity of seniors who use the ser- participants’ physical activity [2, 13–16]. However, as vices of the senior center and compare it with those who demonstrated by Felix et al., [17] not all senior centers did not use the services, and 2) measure the daily phys- can program these specific activities and there is a need ical activity of users and compare the physical activity of to explore how attending a regular senior center can those users who attended the senior center on that par- affect physical activity. Schmitt et al. [18] are the only re- ticular day, with those users who did not attend. searchers who studied seniors in daycare centers outside programmed activities and they found no significant dif- Methods ferences on physical activity when comparing attendees Recruitment process and non-attendees. Further, Kim et al., [19] found at- For this study we used a convenience sample of 227 se- tendees to senior centers to score higher in physical niors (over 65 years of age) living in the Barcelona functionality but those authors did not actually measure Metropolitan Region, Spain. Data were collected in the physical activity. period of 2017–2018 and analyzed in 2019. We con- Other potential benefits of senior centers such as tacted 39 public and private senior centers in search of socialization and reducing isolation have drawn much potential participants. After an initial screening of the more attention. Studies in the body of literature have interested senior centers, a pair of researchers traveled found positive associations between senior center at- to each senior center that had provided positive feedback tendance and self-confidence in seniors’ own abilities (n = 20) and explained the research protocol to all the [20], and having an increased number of acquaintances seniors who had expressed an interest in this study. In and friends [21, 22]. Consistently, attending day pro- those sessions the functioning and maintenance of the grams at senior centers has also been found to delay in- devices were explained, together with the nature of the stitutional and nursing home placement [23, 24] as well data collected. All willing participants were asked to sign as improving wellbeing and mental wellness and redu- a consent form before they were given an accelerometer cing depression rates [19]. Ron [25] found that regular and GPS device and asked to answer a first short survey attendance to senior centers contributed to the self- regarding their sociodemographic characteristics. Add- esteem of older females, while Iecovich and Biderman itionally, a snowball (chain-referral) technique, which [26] found that users of adult day care centers had sig- asks participants to seek volunteers in their social circle, nificant quality of life benefits but found no evidence was used to contact other seniors that lived in the area that users of senior centers used less health services but did not attend the senior centers. As an incentive, all compared with nonusers [27]. participants received a report on their own physical Marquet et al. BMC Geriatrics (2020) 20:134 Page 3 of 10 activity patterns at the end of the study. This report center (n = 21) were excluded from the analysis due to summarized their physical activity during participation the impossibility of clearly determining the extent of and provided advice on how to increase their physical their visits to a senior center. activity in the future. Physical activity: We used the total minutes of seden- tary time, light physical activity (LPA) and moderate-to- Study design vigorous activity (MVPA) of each participant for each Participants were asked to wear a GPS device and an participated day as main measures of physical activity. accelerometer for 7 days. Additionally, all participants We added the total minutes of light, moderate and answered a questionnaire about their sociodemographic vigorous activity to calculate the total minutes of activity characteristics, daily mobility and physical activity pat- recorded during the day by each participant. This in- terns and perceived health status. Body Mass Index cluded physical activity gained while at home, while trav- (BMI) was calculated based on self-reported height and eling and also while at the senior center. weight. The study received the approval of the Autono- mous University of Barcelona (UAB is the Spanish acro- nym) institutional review board (CEEAH-3656). Analysis To examine associations between attending the senior Accelerometer data processing center and the total daily amount of physical activity, we Data from 7-day accelerometer tracking provided esti- used descriptive statistics followed by multilevel linear mates of energy expenditure. Participants had to wear mixed effects models with user ID as a random effect. ActiGraph accelerometers (model GT3X+) for a mini- First, we used one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) to mum of 10 waking hours per day and the gathered data test the differences in weekly physical activity behaviors, were included in the analysis. Following Kamada et al., expressed as total sedentary time, LPA and MVPA, be- [36] a threshold of < 2000 VM counts per min was used tween those participants who attended the senior center to define sedentary time, > 2000 for light, and > 7500 at least one day out of the 7 total participation days, and and > 8500 for moderate to vigorous physical activity those who had not attended the senior center. We then (MVPA), respectively. GPS data were collected using the focused only on senior center users (n = 97), and tested QStarz BT-Q1000X device at intervals of 15 s. Acceler- the day-to-day difference in PA between the days on ometer and GPS data were merged and filtered using which they attended the senior center, and the days on PALMS software [37] and further categorized into mi- which they did not attend. nutes spent being sedentary, in light and moderate-to- Finally, we regressed the attendance to a senior center vigorous physical activity (MVPA) per day. per day onto each of the PA levels, sedentary, LPA, and MVPA, using separate multilevel mixed models. These Sample models included having visited a senior center (1 = yes; The main demographic characteristics of both senior 0 = no) as the dependent variable and gender (M; F), age center users and non-users were highly similar (Table 1). (< 75 yrs.; ≥75 yrs), total device wear-time, distance to Senior center users were slightly older and reported the closest senior center (self-assessed; < 10 min, 10–20 slightly higher weekly physical activity. Both groups had min, 20+ min), perceived health (self-assessed; poor, no differences in access to a senior center, as repre- regular, good), and presence of rain (1 = Rain; 0 = None) sented by their estimated walking time to the nearest se- as main control variables. The control for the presence nior center. The sample was also balanced in terms of of rain is due to some studies having found that weather gender with women being slightly overrepresented in conditions significantly alter the travel behavior and ac- both groups. tivity participation of older people [38] due to the wea- ther conditions impacting on the decisions of older Measures people regarding leaving their homes. Visits to senior center: To determine whether a partici- To better understand the importance of attending the pant had visited a senior center during any of their 7 senior center for each gender and age group combin- participation days, we used a 25 m circular buffer around ation, we created three-way interaction terms for the the senior center. All participants with 20 or more in- variables of age, gender, and senior center attendance door minutes spent within that buffer were considered and then calculated the daily physical activity-adjusted to have visited the senior center during that day. The in- predictions at each representative value using the Stata terior of the 25 m buffers were screened in search of 15 “margins” command. These actions resulted in the grocery stores, gyms, medical centers, libraries or other estimated number of minutes of each PA type per cat- facilities that could gather seniors for substantial periods egory of age, gender, and senior center attendance. We of time. Participants who lived within 100 m of a senior then used the Stata 15 “contrast at sample means” post- Marquet et al. BMC Geriatrics (2020) 20:134 Page 4 of 10 Table 1 Characteristics of the sample Senior center members Non-members Pa Sample N (individuals) 97 130 N of valid days 654 848 Days per participant (Avg) 6.74 6.52 Demographics Average Age (SD) 76.6 (5.9) 73.5 (7.3) Gender 0.966 Male 43 (44.3%) 58 (44.6%) Female 54 (55.7%) 72 (55.4%) Health BMI 0.726 Normal weight 18 (18.6%) 22 (16.9%) Overweight + obesity 65 (67%) 70 (53.8%) nd. 14 (14.4%) 38 (29.2%) Self-reported Health 0.262 Poor 4 (4.1%) 3 (2.3%) Regular 28 (28.9%) 40 (30.8%) Good 65 (67%) 98 (52.3%) b Weekly PA minutes (SD) 285.9 (317.8) 225.3 (234.3) 0.235 Mobility Usual mode of transport 0.420 Walking 57 (58.7%) 89 (68.5%) Public 18 (18.6%) 19 (14.6%) Private 20 (20.6%) 22 (16.9%) c Travel time to senior center 0.558 1–10 min 60 (61.9%) 71 (54.6%) 11–20 min 20 (20.6%) 33 (25.4%) > 20 min 17 (17.5%) 19 (14.6%) nd. 0 (0%) 7 (5.4%) a Based on chi-Square statistics for categorical variables and ANOVA for continuous variables b Self-reported minutes of physical activity obtained using the IPAQ short questionnaire c Self-reported travel time (in minutes) that it would take to walk from home to the closest senior center estimation command to test the significance of the esti- Seniors who attended a senior center at least once mation differences for between-groups. during the participation week accumulated more weekly sedentary time than seniors who had not visited a senior center at all (6789 min vs. 6307 min), although the differ- Results ences at the aggregated level were not significant (Table 2). The final sample comprised of 227 individuals who ac- As expected, older seniors were significantly less active than cumulated 1502 valid days of data. From this sample, 97 younger seniors, while no major gender differences were individuals were identified as regular senior center users, found. Visiting a senior center was not associated with any while 130 individuals where non-users. From an initial level of PA across any gender and age group, with the ex- sample of 269 seniors contacted, only 227 were included ception of Male senior center users, who were more seden- in the analysis due to ineligibility (i.e., they did not leave tary than their male non-senior center user counterparts their residence at least once a day or they presented (6302 min vs. 7140 min; p = 0.03). signs of dementia) or the fact of their insufficient partici- When focusing only on the bivariate association of pation in the study. those participants who had attended the senior center at Marquet et al. BMC Geriatrics (2020) 20:134 Page 5 of 10 Table 2 Physical activity patterns of participants that attended a senior center at least once during the week, and senior participants that did not Ne Sedentarya LPAb MVPAc Total PAd mean SD pf mean SD pf mean SD pf mean SD pf Senior center 0.054 0.899 0.695 0.917 Non-user 130 6307 1963 1405 538 17.5 30.3 1422 550 User 97 6789 1705 1414 527 16.1 22.7 1430 538 Gender 0.295 0.118 0.592 0.133 Female 126 6396 1822 1458 555 16 18.8 1474 563 Male 101 6658 1924 1347 499 17.9 35.2 1364 515 Age 0.278 0.001* 0.021* 0.001* < 75 109 6373 1839 1531 472 21.2 26.4 1552 483 ≥75 118 6642 1894 1296 562 12.8 27.6 1301 573 Female 0.546 0.566 0.270 0.547 Female, non-user 72 6311 1890 1433 565 14.4 14.6 1448 571 Female, user 54 6510 1738 1491 546 18.1 23.3 1509 557 Male 0.03* 0.605 0.266 0.564 Male, non-user 58 6302 2065 1369 507 21.3 42.3 1391 527 Male, user 43 7140 1616 1317 492 13.4 13.4 1330 503 < 75 0.394 0.889 0.806 0.881 < 75, non-user 75 6271 1878 1526 442 20.8 28.2 1547 453 < 75, user 34 6597 1753 1540 540 22.6 22.2 1562 550 ≥75 0.124 0.305 0.965 0.315 ≥75, non-user 55 6355 2087 1239 614 13 32.8 1252 625 ≥75, user 63 6893 1684 1346 512 12.7 22.5 1359 523 Total 227 6512 1869 211.5 73.2 2.5 4.1 214.1 74.9 a Daily time spent sedentary (minutes) b Daily time spent in LPA (minutes) c Daily time spent in MVPA (minutes) d Daily time spent in physical activity (light, moderate or vigorous) (minutes) e Number of participants f One way ANOVA * Statistically significant value least once and their daily physical activity (Table 3), we activity is assessed while taking into account the interac- can see how attending the senior center was not associ- tions of age and gender, together with several control ated with higher daily levels of physical activity, but it variables. Post-estimating the adjusted predictions at was associated with less sedentary time. On a daily basis, each representative value of age and gender after using a female senior center attendees accumulated more light multilevel mixed model (see Supplementary Table 1) we physical activity time than men (222.2 min vs. 190.2 min; can obtain the estimated physical activity of senior cen- p = 0.024) and more total physical activity (224.9 vs. ter attendees for each age and gender group while 192.1 min; p = 0.023). adjusting for several covariates (Table 4). Among the females, having attended the senior cen- It was estimated that females younger than 75 yrs. of ter was associated with more daily sedentary time age accumulated 2.7 more minutes of MVPA on the (989.6 min vs. 907.6; p = 0.001) and with less MVPA days when they had attended the senior center (p = (2.0 min vs. 3.8; p = 0.001). Similarly, on this aggre- 0.002). This represented a 46% increase from the MVPA gated level having attended a senior center during the gained on the days when they had not attended the day was also found to be associated with more seden- senior center. Among older women (> 75 yrs. of age), tary time among older people (75 yrs. of age +) attending the senior center was associated with an esti- (1019.3 min vs. 973.6; p = 0.011). mated 19.8 less sedentary minutes per day (p = 0.001), It is noteworthy that the results changed when the re- 18 min more LPA (p = 0.018) and 1.5 min more MVPA lationship between senior center attendance and physical (p = 0.032). By contrast, males attendance at the senior Marquet et al. BMC Geriatrics (2020) 20:134 Page 6 of 10 Table 3 Senior center users only, comparison between days on which they use it, and days on which they do not Sedentarya Lightb MVPAc Total PAd mean SD pe mean SD p e mean SD p e mean SD pe Senior center 0.01* 0.622 0.213 0.537 Attended 1007.9 21.6 206.9 7.5 2.1 0.4 209.0 7.7 Didn’t attend 969.7 22.8 209.6 7.9 2.6 0.4 212.4 8.1 Gender 0.076 0.024* 0.237 0.023* Female 960.7 27.6 222.2 9.5 2.7 0.4 224.9 9.7 Male 1014.8 30.8 190.2 10.5 1.9 0.5 192.1 10.8 Age 0.053 0.041 0.032 0.036* < 75 978.6 34.9 227.3 11.8 3.2 0.5 230.6 12.1 ≥75 1001.6 26.0 197.2 8.8 1.8 0.4 199.0 9.0 Female 0.001* 0.746 0.001* 0.596 Attended 989.4 27.9 221.4 10.1 2.0 0.5 223.3 10.3 Didn’t attend 907.6 29.5 223.9 10.9 3.8 0.6 227.8 11.1 Male 0.54 0.651 0.106 0.733 Attended 1028.2 32.1 188.8 10.6 2.3 0.5 191.0 10.9 Didn’t attend 1042.9 33.6 192.1 11.1 1.3 0.6 193.1 11.3 < 75 0.333 0.224 0.16 0.183 Attended 987.9 34.3 222.9 12.3 2.8 0.6 225.6 12.6 Didn’t attend 962.9 36.9 235.2 13.4 4.0 0.7 239.3 13.7 ≥75 0.011* 0.659 0.745 0.705 Attended 1019.3 27.6 198.3 9.2 1.8 0.4 199.9 9.4 Didn’t attend 973.5 28.9 195.5 9.7 1.9 0.5 197.5 9.9 a Daily time spent sedentary (minutes) b Daily time spent in LPA (minutes) c Daily time spent in MVPA (minutes) d Daily time spent in physical activity (light, moderate or vigorous) (minutes) e One way ANOVA * Statistically significant value Table 4 Adjusteda estimated minutes of physical activity per age and gender on days with a senior center visit, and days without a visit Sedentaryb LPAc MVPAd e f SC visit No visit Diff %Diff SC visit No visit Diff %Diff SC visit No visit Diff %Diff Female < 75 962.1 977.4 −15.2 −1.6% 248.1 235.7 12.4 5.0% 5.9 3.2 2.7* 46.0% ≥75 985.2 1005.0 −19.8* −2.0% 228.1 210.0 18.0* 7.9% 2.8 1.3 1.5* 52.6% Male < 75 1002.5 1024.4 −21.9 −2.2% 212.3 190.0 22.3 10.5% 1.4 1.9 −0.4 −30.5% ≥75 1033.1 1021.5 11.6 1.1% 181.7 192.3 −10.6 −5.8% 1.3 2.6 −1.3 − 102.6% All < 75 980.2 998.5 −18.2* 1.8% 232.0 215.2 16.8* 7.3% 3.9 2.6 1.3 33.4% ≥75 1006.7 1012.4 −5.7 0.6% 207.2 202.1 5.2 2.5% 2.1 1.9 0.2 10.5% a Adjusted by total device wear time, distance to the closest senior center, perceived health, and presence of rain b Daily time spent sedentary (minutes) c Daily time spent in LPA (minutes) d Daily time spent in MVPA (minutes) e Values for days on which participants have visited a senior center f Values for days on which participants have not visited a senior center * Contrast of estimates between groups (senior center vs no senior center) found significant (p < 0.05) Marquet et al. BMC Geriatrics (2020) 20:134 Page 7 of 10 center was not associated with any physical activity level, As demonstrated by Whaley and Ebbeck [41], active regardless of age. Despite that, it is still noteworthy how seniors can be reluctant to go to the senior center, for older men (> 75 yrs. of age) visiting the senior center because it is a place that they associate with sedentary seems to have negative consequences because the visits activity, older people or people with difficulties [30]. At are associated with more sedentary time, and less light the individual level the benefits of attending a senior and moderate to vigorous physical activity. center can only be understood in relation to the activity Overall, the differences in trends between men and that this visit is replacing. If a senior visits the senior women of older age (> 75 yrs. of age) present on an center instead of staying at home engaging in a seden- aggregated level no significant associations between tary activity, then the senior center will have helped to attending the senior center and any domain of physical increase the physical activity of that senior on that day. activity. However, because the associations of both male Conversely, if the visit to the senior center replaces a trip and female younger seniors (< 75 yrs. of age) were in the to the supermarket or an outdoor yoga class, this visit same direction, they reached statistical significance when will have probably contributed negatively to the physical observed on the aggregated level. Attending the senior activity balance at the end of the day. As a result, attend- center was associated with an estimated 18 min less ance at senior centers cannot be assessed in a vacuum, sedentary time (p = 0.017) and 16.8 min more LPA (p = but rather in the context of the physical activity patterns 0.025). of each population group in terms of age and gender. For more active groups, senior centers will probably be less beneficial than for traditionally more sedentary Discussion groups. This paper has explored the physical activity benefits Therefore, it is also important to measure daily phys- that attending a senior center can have for seniors using ical activity rates while adjusting for several important the objective 7-day physical activity tracking of 227 se- covariates that might be affecting the overall amount of niors living in the Metropolitan Region of Barcelona, physical activity. In this study, after adjusting for total Spain. Physical activity data were obtained using acceler- device wear-time, distance to the senior center, per- ometers, while attendance to senior centers was obtained ceived health, and presence of rain, visiting a senior cen- using GPS measures and GIS processing. Results suggest ter was found to be associated with less sedentary time that the benefits of attending a senior center are not uni- and more light physical activity among seniors younger versal and depend largely on age and gender. than 75 yrs. of age. These findings extend those of Faw- Our results show that older seniors (≥75 yrs. of age) in cett et al. [22] who note that seniors in their study below our study engaged in significantly less weekly LPA and 70 yrs. of age gained greater benefits from visiting the MVPA than their younger counterparts but no statistical senior center in terms of wellbeing, confidence, differences between men and women were found, which empowerment and socializing. is consistent with the previous studies in the body of lit- However, following gender stratification of the popula- erature [35, 39]. Seniors who attended a senior center at tion sample, we found that the group of female partici- least once did not accumulate more weekly physical ac- pants gained greater benefits from attending a senior tivity than seniors with no visit. These results concur center. The female participants increased their light with the findings by Turner et al. [35] who failed to find physical activity by 8%, their MVPA by 52.6% and they a significant association between attending a senior decreased their sedentary time by 2%. For this group, center physical activity program and increased physical having a structured activity during the day might en- activity. In a similar study, Iecovich and Biderman [26] courage them to leave home and contribute to engaging found that attending a senior center produced a number in some additional activities besides going to the senior of benefits in terms of quality of life, but did not include center. physical activity. For the older male seniors (> 75 years of age) in con- This would suggest that we should not automatic- trast, going to the senior center seemed to have mainly ally assume that visiting a senior center has positive negative consequences, although the findings were not benefits in terms of physical activity. Our results statistically significant. Those older male seniors who however might be affected by demographic differences attended the senior center were found to be more seden- between senior center users and non-users. Non-users tary and less active than those older male seniors who were slightly older and reported slightly better health had not attended the senior center during the day, status than those attending the senior center, which although the differences were not found to be signifi- is consistent with age and health being previously cant. Older male adults in general were in fact the only identified as the major determinant of senior center demographic group for which going to a senior center attendance [7, 30, 40]. had negative consequences in terms of physical activity. Marquet et al. BMC Geriatrics (2020) 20:134 Page 8 of 10 These results confirm the findings of Swan et al., [42] at the time of the senior center visit by the participating who observed in their study that senior males were less seniors. It was thus not possible to control for the pres- likely than females to participate in senior center phys- ence of organized activities, that could be both attracting ical activity sessions. This can be explained either by a seniors to the senior center and motivating those senior preference of older male adults to engage in sedentary citizens to lead a more active lifestyle. activities while at the senior center, such as card playing or newspaper reading, or by their usual activities outside Conclusions the senior center being more particularly active, such as According to the data in this study, the benefits of visit- strolling. These results suggest that in the case of older ing senior centers were not universal regarding the study men, activities and programs in senior centers should be participants, but they were rather contingent on socio- focused towards increasing their physical activity and economic groups and alternative behaviors. Visiting a se- discouraging the more sedentary activities. nior center was found to have a positive effect Overall, these findings should inform the program particularly among older females, for whom the senior directors in senior centers to focus on providing more center doubled the total daily amount of recorded exercise-related activities at the same time as aiming MVPA. In contrast, older males were found to have a to avoid more sedentary activities. The goal however negative association between visiting a senior center and needs to be an increase in the physical activity of se- their daily physical activity. A further evaluation of the niors without losing other benefits of senior centers causes behind these differences is necessary, one that such as socializing, developing confidence and exercis- takes into account what kind of behavior and types of ing cognitive abilities. Thus, these more lively activ- activities that the visit to a senior center would be re- ities should also incorporate cognitive tasks, in order placing. However, the results of the present study dem- not to lose the psycho-social benefits of typical senior onstrate the need to promote more intensive senior center activities [43]. center activities among the older male population at the To the best of our knowledge, this paper has been the same time as validating encouraging senior center at- first to use GPS and senior center attendance to assess tendance as a healthy policy for the older female the physical activity benefits of attending a senior center population. during the day. We have used accelerometer data to go beyond self-assessment of physical activity and GPS data to detect senior center attendance. Based on these find- Supplementary information Supplementary information accompanies this paper at https://doi.org/10. ings, our recommendation is that future programming 1186/s12877-020-01527-6. should aim to increase the physical activity of both se- nior men and women in the age range of 65–75 yrs. in Additional file 1: Table S1 Multilevel linear regressions per type of order to add some form of physical activity to the long daily physical activity and participant characteristics. list of benefits that senior centers have for the wellbeing and quality of life of the elderly within the society. Abbreviations This study is not without limitations. First, the sample PA: Physical activity; LPA: Light physical activity; MVPA: Moderate-to-vigorous might be biased towards people whose general health physical activity conditions are good enough for them to be willing to participate in the study, hence they actually might cur- Acknowledgements Not applicable. rently be more active than the ‘average’ type of senior citizen. Similarly, the location of the senior centers was Authors’ contributions chosen randomly and did not follow a pre-established All authors interpreted data, critically revised, and approved the final scheme. The GPS process used to detect senior center manuscript. In addition, OM, MM, XD, GV and CM conceptualized the study, visits was based only on indoor time spent in the prox- obtained funding and were also leading the data gathering efforts. OM and MM designed the current analysis and wrote the manuscript, XD and GV imity of a senior center. Despite the efforts made on contributed to data analysis and reviewed the manuscript, JS and CM both screening other confounding places that could also substantially revised the manuscript. The authors read and approved the gather seniors, that still leaves some room for error in final manuscript. mislocating some physical activity with respect to a se- nior center, when in fact the physical activity was made Funding This project was funded by the RecerCaixa research fund in the 2016 call, outside of the senior center. Unfortunately, in this study, under the original title of “Ciudad, calidad de vida y movilidad activa en la some relevant variables regarding socioeconomic and tercera edad: Un análisis multimetodológico a través de Tracking Living demographic characteristics such as marital status, in- Labs”. OM had a Juan de la Cierva contract from the Spanish Ministry of Economy Industry and Competitiveness (FJCI 2016–28975). None of the come or education were not available to us. Finally, no funders played any role in the design, collection, analysis, or interpretation of information was available on the type of activity available data, nor in writing the manuscript. Marquet et al. BMC Geriatrics (2020) 20:134 Page 9 of 10 Availability of data and materials 14. Sarkisian CA, Prohaska TR, Davis C, Weiner B. Pilot test of an attribution The datasets used and analyzed during the current study are available from retraining intervention to raise walking levels in sedentary older adults. J the corresponding author on any reasonable request. Am Geriatr Soc. 2007;55:1842–6. 15. Moore-Harrison TL, Johnson MA, Quinn ME, Cress ME. An evidence-based Ethics approval and consent to participate exercise program implemented in congregate-meal sites. J Phys Act Health. The study received the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB) 2016;6:247–51. institutional review board approval (CEEAH-3656). All participants provided 16. Porter KN, Fischer JG, Johnson MA. Improved physical function and physical written informed consent. activity in older adults following a community-based intervention : relationships with a history of depression. Maturitas. 2011;70:290–4. https:// doi.org/10.1016/j.maturitas.2011.07.024. Consent for publication 17. Felix HC, Adams B, Cornell CE, Fausett JK, Krukowski RA, Love SRJ, et al. Not applicable. Barriers and facilitators to senior centers participating in translational research. Res Aging. 2014;36:22–39. Competing interests 18. Schmitt EM, Sands LP, Weiss S, Dowling G, Covinsky K. Adult day health The authors declare that they have no competing interests. center participation and health-related quality of life. Gerontologist. 2010;50: 531–40. Author details 19. Kim HS, Harada K, Miyashita M, Lee EA, Park JK, Nakamura Y. Use of senior 1 center and the health-related quality of life in Korean older adults. 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