A Group-Based Walking Study Using WeChat to Enhance Physical Activity Among Older Adults

Not Applicable

Completed

Interventions: Behavioral: Control condition
Behavioral: Treatment condition

Brief Summary: The aim for the study is to use the function WeRun in the application WeChat to encourage physical activity and social engagement among community dwelling older adults and their family members and friends. The specific aims are to test the effectiveness of a social contact and comparison intervention for increasing regular daily physical activity among community dwelling older adults, and to examine the potential effectiveness of WeChat in cultivating social engagement and well-being among community dwelling older adults.

Detailed Description: The aim for the study is to use the function WeRun in the application WeChat to encourage physical activity and social engagement among community dwelling older adults. The investigators asked participants in the social engagement group to use the WeRun function in WeChat to track their daily walking steps and to compare their performance with their group members for 4 weeks. To encourage social engagement among their group members, the daily walking steps were calculated and the participant who has the highest step count in the group will be indicated each day.Those in the control group will only use the WeRun function in WeChat to track their own walking steps.

The investigators expected that the participants in the social contact group will walk more often and report more social activities than those in the control group, who will not compete with their peers in daily walking. To test these predictions, daily walking steps and the total walking steps per week were obtained and compared across groups. The nature and the extent of change was analyzed over the four weeks. Exercise self-efficacy was measured using a measure based on Bandura's model. Social engagement was measured using the short Lubben Social Network Scale, a self report measure of social engagement on a 12-item scale, and physical activity was measured using International Physical Activity Questionnaire (IPAQ), a self-report measure of physical activity on a 12-item scale.

Recruitment & Eligibility

Inclusion Criteria

Participants who are 60 or older who have a cellphone, with either android or iPhone system with data plan.
They must be fit enough to walk for at least 20 minutes at a time.
English speaking

Exclusion Criteria

Arm && Interventions

Group	Intervention	Description
Control Condition	Control condition	Participants only saw their own daily walking steps using the WeRun function in WeChat. They did not use WeChat to see other group members' daily steps and did not engage in social contact with their group members.
Treatment condition	Treatment condition	Participants saw their own and other group member's daily walking steps using the WeRun function in WeChat and they were able to contact the other members of their group using We Chat.

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Number of Steps Walked	[Time Frame: Baseline (pretest) Week, Week 4 (posttest) and Week 8 (one month follow up)]	Weekly average number of steps recorded with WeRun on the phone \[ (averaged across 7 days at Baseline week and averaged across 7 days at Week 4 (Posttest) and averaged across 7 days at Week 8 (one month follow up)\].

Secondary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Social Engagement	Pretest given 1 week before the intervention and then at the posttest after the 4 week study and one month follow up	Short Lubben Social Network Scale-Revised, a self-report measure of social engagement on a 12-item scale. The total score is calculated by the sum of all the items. The total score ranges between 0 and 60, with a higher score indicating more social engagement.
Exercise Self Efficacy	Pretest given 1 week before the intervention and then at the posttest after the 4 week study and one month follow up	This scale is a self-report of exercise self-efficacy. Total score is calculated by summing the responses to each question. This scale has a range of total scores from 0-90. A higher score indicates higher self-efficacy for exercise.