Dataset "Creativity and physical activity in children from an Ecological Dynamics perspective on Traditional Practice and Active Outdoor Play"

This cross-sectional study examined the association between children’s physical activity levels and the type of leisure-time motor experience with creativity among primary school pupils. From an Ecological Dynamics perspective, creativity was conceptualised as the exploration of diversified motor solutions under the interaction of constraints, particularly those related to the environment, and therefore potentially shaped by practice contexts and by the opportunity to engage in motor experiences enriched by the characteristics of outdoor environments. A total of 160 children (11.48 ± 0.56 years) completed the Physical Activity Questionnaire for Children (PAQ-C) to estimate physical activity levels and undertook the ACR test to assess creativity. Physical activity level was positively associated with creativity (Spearman’s ρ = 0.557 for total ACR; p < .001), with significant relationships also observed for each component. Children who did not engage in any leisure-time motor–sport activity were excluded from the full sample, yielding an analytical subsample of N = 139. The remaining participants were then classified into two groups: Active Outdoor Play (AOP) and Traditional Practice (TP). The AOP group (n = 71) exhibited higher total creativity than the TP group (n = 68) (Mann–Whitney U = 754, p < .001; rank-biserial = 0.688), with higher scores in the C and R components. An OLS model including PAQ-C and activity type explained 45.6% of the variance in total creativity (R² = .456); both PAQ-C (b = 2.686, p < .001) and AOP (vs TP; b = 3.009, p < .001) made independent contributions. Overall, these findings appear to suggest that, in this sample and considering the adopted measurement and analytical approach, creativity is associated not only with “how much” children move, but also with “how” they experience motor engagement, with more exploratory play contexts associated with higher creative profiles.