Assessment of the Predictors and Moderators of Health Behavior Change

Not Applicable

Completed

• Conditions: Health Behaviors
• Interventions: Behavioral: Planning; Behavioral: Values Clarification; Behavioral: Combined

• Registration Number: NCT03139656
• Lead Sponsor: Boston University Charles River Campus

Brief Summary

This study will investigate three interventions-values clarification, planning, or combined (values clarification + planning)-for increasing goal-consistent health behavior (e.g., exercise or dieting). The investigators will also examine how intervention effects differ based on various psychological and neuropsychological factors, to better understand how interventions can be tailored to specific individuals.

The investigators hypothesize a) that the combined intervention will increase goal-consistent exercise behavior more than the other interventions; and b) that individuals scoring higher on self-concordance or goal-commitment will benefit more from planning, whereas those with more positive expectancies or scoring higher on neuropsychological measures (e.g., working memory) will benefit more from values clarification.

Detailed Description

The study will be a repeated measures design examining the between-subjects effect of intervention condition (values clarification, planning, and combined) on self-reported health goal progress and related outcomes at 1-week and 4-week follow-up, relative to baseline. Based on this design, participants will first be instructed to generate a health-related goal on which they want to make progress over the course of the next month (following procedures adapted from Little, 1993, and Sheldon \& Kasser, 1998; see details below). Participants will then be randomly assigned (using a random number table) to one of three intervention conditions: (1) values clarification, (2) planning, and (3) combined (values clarification + planning). All conditions are described in more detail below. Fifty-three participants will be randomized to each condition. Questionnaire measures assessing a variety of psychological variables as well as neuropsychological measures will be modeled as between-subject predictor and/or moderator variables of goal-consistent health behavior. Additionally, differences in self-concordance, goal commitment, and expectancies of success will be modeled as potential moderator and/or mediator variables.

Study Timeline

• Study Start: 2017-03-01
• Study First Submitted: 2017-04-28
• Study First Submitted QC: 2017-05-01
• Study First Posted: 2017-05-04
• Status Verified: 2018-06
• Primary Completion: 2018-06-13
• Study Completion: 2018-06-13
• Last Update Submitted: 2018-06-13
• Last Update Posted: 2018-06-15

Recruitment & Eligibility

• Status: COMPLETED
• Sex: All
• Target Recruitment: 118

Inclusion Criteria

• Boston University Psychology 101 students at least 18 years of age
• Able to provide informed consent for the study
• Sufficient command of the English language
• Have experience using a computer and mouse

Exclusion Criteria

• None

Study & Design

• Study Type: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Design: PARALLEL

Arm && Interventions

Group	Intervention	Description
Planning	Planning	Participants in this condition will be guided to create detailed implementation intentions, or if-then planning statements (Gollwitzer \& Sheeran, 2006), specifying when, how, and where they will engage in their selected health goal. Participants will be provided with a detailed rationale adapted from earlier research on implementation intentions (e.g., Webb et al., 2010). Participants will be guided to generate a plan indicating when, where, and how they will enact their goal-based behavior over the next week. They will also be prompted to identify 3 obstacles they are likely to encounter during the pursuit of each goal, and to specify in an "if-then" format what specific actions they will take to overcome each obstacle (following the procedures and sample "if-then" responses of Koestner et al., 2002). They will be asked to rehearse each "if-then" statement to themselves before the end of the visit.
Values Clarification	Values Clarification	This intervention will incorporate elements from several widely established self-regulatory strategies aimed at enhancing the motivational aspects of goal pursuit, including mental contrasting (Oettingen, 2000), self-reflection (Koestner et al., 2002), self-affirmation (Schmeichel and Vohs, 2009), and the values clarification components of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT; Hayes, Strosahl, \& Wilson, 1999). Participants will be prompted to enter their selected health goal and will then be instructed to identify personal values that might be practiced in pursuit of this goal. Participants will write about these values for several minutes, after which they will be instructed to select a short phrase or image that conjures up for them the reasons they choose to engage in their goal. Participants will be asked to type the phrase into a textbox and will have the option of receiving a confidential print-out of their chosen phrase at the end of the study visit.
Combined (Values Clarification & Planning)	Combined	Participants in this condition will complete abbreviated versions of both the "values clarification" and "planning" procedures, as detailed above. Participants will be prompted to identify 2 obstacles (as opposed to 3) they might encounter during the pursuit of each goal. For each of the obstacles they identify with respect to each of their target goals, they will be prompted to form an additional implementation intention in the form: "When \[I encounter the specified obstacle\], I will do \[X\] and remember \[values-based statement or image identified during "values clarification" exercise\]." They will be asked to rehearse these "if-then" statements to themselves before the end of the visit.

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Goal Progress	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	This 3-item goal progress measure assesses participants' self-reported effort towards and success at meeting their specified goal over the past week, each on a 7-point Likert scale. The third item assesses the number of actions participants have undertaken to realize their goal in the past week (previously shown to be a valid indicator of goal pursuit; Oettingen et al., 2001; Sevincer \& Oettingen, 2009).

Secondary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS)	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	Participants rate 20 adjectives describing positive and negative affect states on a 5-point Likert scale indicating to what extent they currently feel that way.
Action Control Scale - Preoccupation subscale	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	This is an abbreviated version of the scale designed by Diefendorff et al. (2000).
Delay Discounting Task	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	The Delay Discounting Task adapted from Kirby and Marakovic (1996) evaluates the degree to which participants are willing to delay rewards.
Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale (CES-D)	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	The CES-D (Radloff, 1977) is a 20-item measure of items relating to or indicating symptoms of depression experienced over the past week.
Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI)	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	The BAI (Beck, Epstein, Brown, \& Steer, 1988) is a commonly used 21-item, self-report inventory designed to measure severity of anxiety symptoms.
Implicit Attitudes toward Effort	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	The investigators will use an adapted version of the Brief Implicit Association Test (B-IAT; Sriram \& Greenwald, 1998) to assess participants' implicit tendency to appraise the experience of effort as either "good" or "bad."
Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS)	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	The SWLS (Diner, Emmons, Larsen, \& Griffin, 1985) is a 5-item scale assessing global cognitive judgments of one's current life satisfaction.
Goal Orientation Scale	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	This is a 5-item scale that assesses participant's orientation toward a growth/learning-focused versus fixed/performance-focused motivation, adapted from Brett and VandeWalle (1999).
Distress Intolerance Index (DII)	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	The DII is a 10-item self-report questionnaire consisting of items from four commonly used distress intolerance measures.
Self-Control Scale	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	The SCS (Tangney et al., 2004) is a 10-item measure of ability to implement self-control across varying situations.
Goal Rating Measure	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	On a 7-point Likert scale, participants will rate their health-related goal regarding their expectancies of success, their energization towards the goal, and the perceived difficult and importance of the goal.
Penn State Worry Questionnaire--Brief Version	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	The Brief Penn State Worry Questionnaire (Brief PSWQ;Topper et al., 2014) is a 5-item self-report scale that assess the tendency to worry.
Need for Cognition Scale (Short Form)	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	The NCS-SF (Cacioppo, Petty, \& Kao, 1984) is an 18-item scale that assesses the characteristic tendency to enjoy and seek out cognitively challenging tasks and activities.
Cognitive Reflection Test (CRT)	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	The CRT (Frederick, 2005) is a 3-item task that assesses the tendency to use "fast," intuitive heuristic-based reasoning versus "slow," more deliberative reasoning
Perceived Locus of Causality (PLOC)	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	The PLOC scale (Sheldon \& Kasser, 1995, 1998) is a 4-item measure of the level of autonomy or self-concordance that participants experience with respect to a given goal.
Ruminative Responses Scale--Brief Version	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	The Brief Ruminative Responses Scale (Brief RRS; Topper et al., 2014) is a 5-item self-report scale that assess the tendency to ruminate.
Generalized Self-Efficacy Scale (GSE)	Change from baseline to 1-week and 4-week follow-ups	The GSE (Schwarzer \& Jerusalem, 1995) is a 10-item scale designed to assess optimistic self-beliefs used to cope with a variety of demands in life.

Trial Locations

Locations (1)

Boston University; 🇺🇸 Boston, Massachusetts, United States