Learning Activities

Chapter 6

In Class

1. Stages of exercise behaviour change (SOC)

With reference to the current recommendations for physical activity for health (at least 30 minutes moderate activity, like walking, accumulated on most days of the week) or for fitness (at least 3 sessions per week of moderate to vigorous activity lasting at least 20 minutes), read through the following categories. Then decide which category best describes how physically active you have been over the last six months. The categories refer to the stages of exercise behaviour change.

I am not physically active and do not intend to be so in the next six months ... 1

I am not regularly active but am thinking about starting to be so in the next six months ... 2

I do some physical activity but not enough to meet the description of regular activity ... 3

I am regularly physically active but only began in the last six months ... 4

I am regularly physically active and have been for longer than 6 months ... 5

2. Decisional balance

Now complete the ‘Decisional Balance’ exercise:

Decisional Balance (Marcus and Owen, 1992)

I would be healthier if I exercised regularly

I would feel better about myself if I exercised regularly

Other people would respect me more if I exercised regularly

My family and friends would get to spend less time with me if I exercised regularly

I would feel that I was wasting my time if I exercised regularly

I would probably be sore and uncomfortable if I exercised regularly

A five point Likert scale was used to rate each item ranging from:
Not at all Important (1) to Extremely Important (5)
score your own decisional balance … do your pros outweigh cons?

Thinking more in a more qualitative way, write down what you consider to be the three most important pros and cons for being regularly physically active from your own perspective.

Out of class

You will find this website very useful concerning the Transtheoretical Model (TTM) across different health domains and behaviours http://www.uri.edu/research/cprc/index-old.htm

Your task is to:

1. go to the Transtheoretical Model web link
2. go to the Detailed overview of the Transtheoretical Model
3. summarise this text in 500 words and make application to physical activity
4. write a further 200 words of critique of the TTM as it applies to physical activity. For example, you may wish to consider measurement, logical nature of the constructs, overlap between stages, changes to consider in applying the TTM to physical activity etc. You can be speculative and can risk making mistakes! We just want you to think about these issues rather than be definitive based on a thorough understanding of the literature. The latter will be unlikely at this stage of your work.