Schedule Intervention to Increase Sustainable Walking Activity in Midlife Working Adults

Not Applicable

Completed

• Conditions: Physical Activity

• Registration Number: NCT03272438
• Lead Sponsor: Brandeis University

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.

Study Timeline

• Study First Submitted: 2017-04-25
• Study First Submitted QC: 2017-09-01
• Study First Posted: 2017-09-05
• Study Start: 2018-04-13
• Primary Completion: 2019-07-24
• Study Completion: 2019-07-24
• Status Verified: 2022-09
• Last Update Submitted: 2025-02-13
• Last Update Posted: 2025-02-17

Recruitment & Eligibility

• Status: COMPLETED
• Sex: All
• Target Recruitment: 149

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

Study & Design

• Study Type: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Design: PARALLEL

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Physical activity	Daily for 9 weeks	Number of steps taken each day as measured on accelerometer

Secondary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
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

Trial Locations

Locations (1)

Brandeis University; 🇺🇸 Waltham, Massachusetts, United States