Physical Activity
Conditions
Keywords
steps, goals
Brief summary
While people commonly understand that regular physical exercise conveys many health benefits, only 20% of U.S. adults take regular exercise and they have difficulty maintaining new healthy behaviors. The goal of this study is to use a planning intervention to help establish and maintain a daily step regimen in working midlife adults. The investigators will ask participants to plan when, where, and how to act on a daily walking goal in conjunction with a scheduling intervention to increase the chances that they will maintain this new regimen. The effectiveness of three different scheduling interventions will be compared.
Detailed description
While people commonly understand that regular physical exercise conveys many health benefits, only 20% of U.S. adults take regular exercise and they have difficulty maintaining new healthy behaviors. The goal of this study is to use a planning intervention to help establish and maintain a daily step regimen in working midlife adults. The investigators will ask participants to plan when, where, and how to act on a daily walking goal in conjunction with a scheduling intervention to increase the chances that they will maintain this new regimen. Participants will be randomly assigned to one of three conditions: consistent schedule, inconsistent schedule, no schedule. All participants will be provided with an accelerometer to measure their daily activity and as a behavioral support for our intervention and they will be given a step goal. The goal given to each individual will be to increase immediately their daily steps to a level based on recommended guidelines (e.g., Hill, Wyatt, Reed, and Peters, 2003). The investigators will test which version of the scheduling intervention is most successful for increasing and maintaining step counts. It is predicted that participants in the consistent schedule condition will increase their step count more than those participants in the no schedule control condition, and that they will maintain this activity for a longer period after the intervention period is complete than those participants in the inconsistent schedule condition.
Interventions
DEVICEAccelerometer
Participants use an accelerometer to monitor their steps activity
BEHAVIORALStep goal
Participants are given a daily step goal to aim for
BEHAVIORALConsistent contexts
Participants plan to take steps in contexts that are similar from day to day
BEHAVIORALInconsistent contexts
Participants plan to take steps in contexts that vary from day to day
Sponsors
Brandeis University
Study design
Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Intervention model
PARALLEL
Primary purpose
SUPPORTIVE_CARE
Masking
SINGLE (Subject)
Masking description
Participants are not aware of whether they are in an experimental or control condition.
Intervention model description
Participants will be randomly assigned to one of three between-subjects conditions: consistent schedule, inconsistent schedule, no schedule. The study is a longitudinal study over 9 weeks, including a baseline week, a 4-week intervention and a follow-up assessment 4 weeks after the intervention.
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
40 Years to 65 Years
Healthy volunteers
Yes
Inclusion criteria
* currently working 3 or more days (or 24 hours or more) per week; * physically minimally active (as determined using the International Physical Activity Questionnaire (IPAQ)
Exclusion criteria
* a recent (within the past 6 months) cardiovascular event, or fall. * anyone who already exercises regularly, 3 times a week or more for at least 30 minutes, will be excluded
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Physical activity | Daily for 9 weeks | Number of steps taken each day as measured on accelerometer |
Secondary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Measures of well being | Before and after intervention (5 weeks apart), and at followup (4 weeks later) | Feelings of satisfaction with life, perceived stress, mood and sleep quality |
| Physical activity self-efficacy and ease | Weekly for 4 weeks | Perceived ability and ease of being physically active |
Countries
United States
Outcome results
None listed