Background: China has the world’s largest population, going under health transition due to industrialization, urbanization, and a sedentary lifestyle. About 82% of China’s disease burden is due to the prevalence of non-communicable diseases (NCDs). Physical activity (active travel) is the best preventive measure against NCDs. The Chinese government has introduced several steps to improve national fitness and overcome NCDs among the aging population. Exercise and sports play a vital role in promoting physical activity and helpful in accomplishing the national fitness level for Healthy China under the national fitness plan (NFP). Objective: The current study aimed to explore the role of national fitness plan (NFP) in promoting physical activity and health well-being preventing NCDs under built environment intervention. Methods: The study was exploratory, and the mixed-method approach was used to analyze the primary and secondary data. Quantitative content analysis was used to analyze the collected data. A purposive sampling technique was used to collect the primary data from those individuals rich in knowledge about the National Fitness Plan (NFP) of China and its role in promoting physical activity for physical fitness. Results: The majority of the participants (32.0%) said that the national fitness plan helps promote sports environment and health. About 28.0% reported that NFP helps promote cycling and walk environments for physical activity and health promotion and preventing non-communicable diseases (NCDs). Conclusion: Participation in physical exercise and sports is the preferred approach to prevent different diseases. In the context of rising active living among the Chinese people, the facilities such as built environment and green parks under the national fitness plan (NFP) for sports play a crucial role in the mitigation of NCDs.

The spread of COVID-19 has led students to take classes online (rather than face-to-face) worldwide, including in China. For this study, we conducted qualitative focus group discussions to identify the experience of and difficulties faced by online physical education students in higher education taking online classes, including the impact on their physical activity performance, as well as some health problems they face while taking online classes during the quarantine period, such as weight gain, depression, and anxiety. Finally, utilizing Mayer’s learning model as a conceptual framework, we propose a method that addresses how to effectively manage an optimal future learning system for physical education students, both during and after the COVID-19 outbreak situation. During the isolation period of COVID-19, the required equipment for the participants was rarely available at home while attending the online classes, which inevitably reduced the number of physical education units that could be conveyed. This resulted in a transfer of attention from competition to underperformance, weight gain, and adverse psychological conditions. We conclude that it is important to review and systematize the methods of online physical education learning, particularly highlighting the cultural and educational characteristics of different countries, and to investigate the effectiveness of online physical education as a whole.

Physical activity (PA) refers to any action produced by skeletal muscle that consumes energy. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), PA is the primary element that can improve health at the community level. Obviously, PA plays an important role in the social, physical, and mental development of men and women, as well as in balancing weight. However, the large-scale negative impacts of physical inactivity on health-related issues are also recognized globally, such as obesity, which is the source of many non-communication diseases (NCDs). In Pakistan alone, 46% of deaths occur due to NCD. The majority of NCD deaths are linked to obesity, and Pakistan is the ninth most obese country in the world. Research on obesity caused by sedentary work in Pakistan is lacking, especially among university employees. To fill this gap, the current study mainly focuses on the rising non-communicable disease (NCD) rates among university employees in Pakistan due to a lack of exercise (obesity, in this case), with the help of a self-designed knowledge, attitude, and practice (KAP) questionnaire. Five universities in the Sindh province of Pakistan were surveyed (n = 276), following the concept of Yin–Yang as a theoretical lens. The results of the current study show that the knowledge, behaviors, and attitudes of university employees have a great influence on their body mass index (BMI). The study shows that Pakistani residents’ (especially teaching staff) perceptions and attitudes towards obesity and PA have been instructive, but their practices need to be improved.

In sports literature, women’s participation in physical activities has always been characterized as “problematic.” Muslim women’s participation is often considered to be limited by their culture and religion, which also affects their attitude toward physical activities. The purpose of this study is to explore the participation and perceived constraints of Pakistani female students in physical activities, using a feminism-in-sports approach. Semi-structured and informant-style interviews with female students from Larkana, Pakistan, were conducted. The results show that participants either do not practice or participate very little, due to the limitations of socioeconomic factors, religious values, and culture. By exploring the diverse ways in which 20 female students talk about their participation in sports activities, we provide different narratives for sports decision-makers (at the school and government level), parents, and community practitioners (political and religious) to consider and draw upon in their curriculum and policy design, as well as daily practices, to support women’s participation in sport activities.

This study examines the language practices in educational settings in Pakistan, taking the multilingual groupings in society into account. In Pakistan, each province is linked to the single or multiple identities of its people and the languages spoken by the majority. The national language Urdu is limited to educational settings and its function as a lingua franca. English serves people in authority, in offices, and in educational settings. Through discourse-ethnographic analysis, this study examines the individual and joint actions of policymakers and teachers to understand the role of language in educational policy and its practice in educational settings. The interview data identified issues regarding the relationship between language, identity, nation, region, religion, power, and personal attainment in regional, national, and international settings. Moreover, the power of national education policy to produce adequate results is limited by the regional discourses that policymakers ignore. This study concludes by arguing that policy practices for language-in-education in multilingual societies require thoughtful planning which should be informed by local conditions and requirements for its better implementation.

Historically, women’s participation in activities outside of the home, such as in sport, has been discouraged due to several reasons. This article aims to explore the barriers to women in sporting activities by addressing the ratio of their participation in capitals of each province of Pakistan, using the feminist lens. With the help of stratified random sampling, women’s colleges in four Pakistani provincial capital cities were surveyed, using a questionnaire specifically designed for this study. M-plus was used to eliminate the questions which had little or no influence on female participation in sport. Independent sample t-test, one-way ANOVA then post hoc test and follow-up results revealed that sub-dimensions of the constraints ‘Mass Media’ and ‘Religious and Cultural’ were the most significant factors, with mean up to 2.8 and 2.7, respectively. There are significant differences (p < 0.05) in constraints experienced by female students in big and small cities and in public and private institutions. The results provide preliminary evidence that alerting family members to the benefits of sport and providing facilities for women can enhance their participation.