It is broadly recognized that regular physical activity is an essential health-promoting behavior for the overall development of children, such as physical growth, psychological stability, cognitive-function improvement, and smooth social networking [1]. In particular, it is very important to make regular physical activities a daily life from childhood because adolescents with a lot of physical experience are likely to continue physical activities even when they become adults. However, the lack of physical activity among children and adolescents in Korea is serious that a recent study suggests that Korea is the world’s worst youth physical activity lack country [2]. In addition, physical education in Korea is mostly largely focused on measuring physical factors such as 100m running or sit-ups or performing and learning skills in some sports events (basketball, volleyball, soccer, badminton, etc.). Therefore, if you lack basic physical strength or are not good at the sports, it is likely to be perceived as a person who is not good at sports [3]. And it appears as a phenomenon of avoiding physical or sports activities, and this phenomenon helps to become a country with the world’s worst lack of physical activity.

Recently, the term, physical literacy (PL) has frequently appeared in physical education at home and abroad. First proposed by Margaret Whitehead at the International Association of Physical Education and Sport for Girls and Women Congress in Australia in 1993 [4]. PL does not simply refer to regular physical engagement and functional aspects of physical activity. It is a concept that includes an understanding of the knowledge needed to sustain physical activity, the beneficial effects of physical activity on health, interactions with the social environment, and psychological characteristics (confidence, motivation, faith, etc.) required to regularly participate in physical activity.

As the importance of PL has emerged at domestically and internationally, it is a concept that has also attracted attention in the fields of education, sports, physical activity (PA), recreation, and health care [5]. However, the definition of PL has not yet been clearly agreed upon [6], The evaluation method also shows some differences among scholars [7, 8]. [9] defines PL as “motivation, confidence, physical competence, knowledge, and understanding to recognize and take responsibility for the value of participating in physical activities whole life.” However, PL is also defined as the achievement of physical education [10] or the ability, confidence, and aspiration required for physical activity [11]. Furthermore, in Australia, PL is defined as a lifelong holistic learning process acquired and applied in the context of movement and physical activity [12].

Canadian Assessment of Physical Literacy (CAPL), Physical Literacy Assessment for Youth (PLAY), Passport for Life (PEL), Perceived Physical Literacy Inventory (PPLI), and PE Metrics [13] have been developed as evaluation tools to measure the multifaceted aspects of PL. In general, the measurement tool of PL is determined by the concept of PL defined by institutions, organizations, and scholars [14], and the most studied evaluation tool is CAPL developed in Canada [15]. Currently, a new version of CAPL-2 is being used, and [16] proposed the possibility of international standardization of Canadian measurement tools (CAPL-2) through research. In addition, [17] explained the applicability of PL in health education and health promotion sites in the United States and emphasized the relationship between physical activity and health and PL. [14] confirmed the validity and reliability of the measurement tool in applying the CAPL-2 evaluation tool developed in Canada to Chinese children. [18] developed a defined and standardized conceptual model of PL through the Delphi survey method and argued that this model consists of four educational areas (physical, psychological, cognitive, and social). However, in the case of Korea, there are only some opinions suggesting the necessity or educational content and direction of the concept of PL as an alternative concept to replace existing knowledge [19, 20]. In addition, studies have been suggested in Korea that cognitive parts related to physical activity do not have much influence on factors affecting physical activity [21, 22]. Nevertheless, some studies argue that knowledge related to physical activity which is a cognitive domain, plays an important role in leading individual decision-making and health-oriented behavior. [23] Looking at these conflicting research results, it is necessary to verify the validity and reliability of the constituent factors included in PL in Korea. And this study investigates whether the scale developed abroad is applicable to domestic students. In particular, when foreign-developed test papers are used in Korea, there may be differences in cognitive, psychological, and social questions, so this study will focus on the psychological, cognitive, and social questions of CAPL-2, excluding physical fitness factors. In addition, this study confirmed the subjects’ responses according to gender and exercise stages to confirm the possibility of CAPL-2 as a useful tool for measuring PL.

The purpose of this study was to confirm whether cognitive and psychological factors of CAPL-2 scale, which are frequently used to measure PL, are also applicable in Korea. As a result of the analysis to confirm this, in the existing CAPL-2 scale, 3 items were excluded from the “motivation and confidence” factor, and 6 items were excluded from the “knowledge and understanding” factor. Then The original CAPL-2 scale included “motivation”, “competence”, “predilection”, and “adequacy” item questions as “motivation and confidence” factors. However, in the Korean version of CAPL-2, questions about “predilection and adequacy” were responded as a single factor, and through expert meetings, that factor has been named as “interest”. As a result, the findings indicated that the Korean PL scale consists of 4 sub-factors with 15 items (Interest=5 items, Motivation= 3 items, Competence=3 items, Understanding=4 items).

It has witnessed that CAPL-2 has been widely applied to measure PL and revised into different languages such as Chinese [14], Greek [30], Latin [13] and African [31]. Based on such broad applicability of the CAPL-2, the current study was attempted to confirm whether CAPL-2 is a valid to assess PL among Korean children. In specific, the current study reported that “knowledge” factor with all items in CAPL-2 was excluded. These findings are supported in previous studies [14, 30], demonstrating that “knowledge” and “understanding” factors showed low reliability. In contrast, the current findings indicated that the reliability and validity of “motivation” and “competence” factors were high and supported by previous studies. It is plausible to explain that reliability is sensitive to the number of items, and hence the small number of items in “knowledge” and “understanding” factors may be the reason for low reliability [32].

In addition, “motivation” and “competence” factors have a Likert scale of response, but in the case of “knowledge” and “understanding” factors relating to physical activity, the response to the item is evaluated by dichotomous scale (“right” or “wrong”), which may result in low reliability [16, 33]. Additionally, the “knowledge” factor does not show low reliability and validity in the current study, but some previous studies were found to be reliable and valid, although they were of the same type of scale as CAPL-2 [21, 34]. Therefore, it should be careful to apply the findings for further research. There is a need for further study to see whether it is an aspect of Korean sample. Regarding “knowledge” factor, Park and Kim [21] also suggested that this factor has no influence on the behavioral practice of Korean adults. However, Sveibi [35] explained that knowledge is the ability to act and necessary to conceptualize our goals, predict events, and change. Although knowledge may not respond immediately, it is argued that it’s significant because it leads to behavioral changes in the long term [36]. Regarding these various results, Whitehead [37] explained that the concept of PL may not be appropriate in all countries because it is socially constructed. In other words, in this study conducted on Korean children, factors related to knowledge raise the need to change the scale and modify the contents considering the Korean curriculum.

Moreover, the current study investigated how PL differs by gender and or the stage of physical activity. The findings indicated that there was no difference in PL by gender, but sub-factors of PL showed significant differences by the stage of physical activity. The current findings on gender are different from previous studies, demonstrating that boys have higher PL or physical activity than girls [30]. Although it is generally suggested that physical activity and PL decreases with increasing in age [38, 39], there was no difference between gender in the current study. This is contrary to the results of a study in which male students generally have more physical activity than female students [40]. However, there are studies in which there was no difference in physical activity according to gender in the lower grades before the secondary sexual characteristics appeared [41, 42]. In this study, it is interpreted that this result was shown as a large number of students in the 3rd to 4th grades of elementary school participated.

The current findings indicated that the participants in the action and maintenance stages of physical activity show higher scores in PL than those in the precontemplation and contemplation stages. It is plausible to interpret that that the higher the amount of physical activity, and the higher stages of physical activity (i.e., action and maintenance), the higher the positive psychological variables (i.e., motivation, competence etc.) related to physical activity [43, 44]. Kang [45] explained that as the level of physical activity among elementary school student increases, positive psychological attributes such as self-resilience and prosocial behavior increases, meanwhile negative psychological attributes such as anxiety and stress decreases.

The current study attempted to confirm the applicability of CAPL-2, which measures PL for Korean population, and revealed that “motivation” and “competence” factors of CAPL-2 were apparently confirmed as a significant factor of the Korean PL scale. Meanwhile, the finding indicated that “knowledge” and “understanding” factors should be further studied to be validated, Therefore, Further study is necessary to secure the reliability and validity of the Korean PL scale by supplementing the correction or response responses to the content related to “knowledge” and “understanding” factors of the Korean PL scale. This study was the first to validate the CAPL-2 into the Korean children. The Korean PL scale, partly developed in this study, offers the possibility of assessing PL to researchers and practitioners and Korean children’s physical activity enhancement could be easily tracked in school and community settings.