Title: Compare experiences of professionals that work with children with different levels of physical activity, stress level and sleep quality.

Research has shown that people who work with children have high levels of stress which leads to burnout and retention (Forrester, 2017). However, not much is currently known about the experience of people who work in a highly stressed environment and are physically inactive yet have good quality of sleep.  

The aims of this project are:  

1. To explore the experiences of educational professionals who are highly stressed and physically inactive, but have good sleep quality, and  

1. To compare the experiences of educational professionals with different levels of physical activity, stress level and sleep quality. 

Methods 

Both quantitative and qualitative research methods will be adopted in this study. The quantitative method includes questionnaires for general demographic such as the participants’ age, gender, marital status, what their profession is and their income, then followed by The Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI), Depression Anxiety Stress Scale (DASS) and International Physical Activity Questionnaire (IPAQ). Approximately 35 individuals will be surveyed. Based on the reported levels of physical activity, stress level and sleep quality, 4-5 participants will be invited to an in-depth individual interviews (qualitative investigation) which allows me to gain insights and different perspectives.  Purposive sampling will be used. I plan to interview different educational professionals such as teachers, teaching assistants and school social workers in Hong Kong, but not limited to these groups.  

Write a literature review on concepts of sleep quality, physical activity and stress (in correlation to each other) and their impacts if ther is too much stress, or when there is not enough physical activity, or when the sleeping quality is bad. The research is based on professionals working with children i.e. teachers, social workers and teaching assistants. My findings are coherent to my assumptions. Professionals working with children work in highly stressed environments, even though they are physically inactive, they still have good quality of sleep.