By Kirsten Hancock
Every parent knows that physical activity and playtime are important elements of healthy growth and development. They're also a lot of fun.
Let's face it, there wouldn't be too many kids who wouldn't enjoy running around the park, building a cubby amongst the trees or clamouring all over a playground.
But getting the right life/play balance isn't always easy for some parents.
There are the obvious obstacles such as holding down a job or perhaps lacking the means of getting to and from suitable play places easily.
Then there's the less obvious, the influences that as a parent you either don't realise or can't control.
There's been a flurry of studies around physical activity in kids over the years and two that have just been published add plenty of weight to the 'better exercise = healthy kids' way of thinking.
My own research is one of those. Using data from the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children I was able to look at the impact of parenting styles on the health and wellbeing of more than 4000 Aussie kids.
What I, and the rest of the research team from The Kids Research Institute Australia found, was quite surprising.
For the first time we were able to uncover a link between higher levels of protective parenting and childhood obesity, with the research telling us that the more overprotective the parenting style the greater the risk that a child will be overweight or obese by the time they turn 10 or 11.
What's interesting about our study is that we looked at children of all ages but the 10-11 year old group was the only one that displayed health concerns when it came to weight.
Whilst at this stage of the research we don't know why this age is most affected, we believe it may be something to do with their desire to break free and head into the world on their own a little more.
This is an age when kids usually start to express their need for more independence and are keen to do more on their own - walk to school, go riding with friends, head to the park.
If a parent is overprotective or more controlling, highly supervising or finding it difficult to spend time away from their kids, then this could have implications for how their children view and navigate their environment, in turn impacting on their activity levels and health.
Our study also showed that there were higher levels of maternal protectiveness amongst disadvantaged families including those with lower income levels, lower maternal education levels and those living in more disadvantaged neighbourhoods.
Again the research is early stages and more needs to be done to get a clearer picture of what we have discovered, however it does lead me to another recent study that has also shed some light on the role our living environment plays in our kid's physical and mental wellbeing.
This research from the Australian Institute of Family Studies, and also using Longitudinal Study of Australian Children data, found that children spent significantly less time playing outdoors if their parents felt their neighbourhood was unsafe.
In fact, the research found kids spent on average 20 minutes less a day playing outside if parents had neighbourhood safety concerns.
The study's co-author Ben Edwards warned the lower outdoor play time, which equated to more than 100 hours a year, could have serious implications for a child's weight and psychological wellbeing.
So two research studies and two similar messages about the need to find balance between parenting comfort and the ability of our kids to get out and about and enjoy their physical environment.
Granted the research is early days in both cases but you can't ignore the evidence; physical activity outdoors is essential for the long term health and wellbeing of our future generations.