Age, physical activity motivation and perceived stress in minority girls

Background: Physical activity in childhood and adolescence helps support physical and emotional health. Purpose: The study aimed to investigate if age was related to motivation for physical activity in minority girls, and whether the relationship may be potentially mediated by psychological or physiological stress. Methods: This cross-sectional observational study recruited Latino and African American girls ages 8 – 12 years (n = 79) in Tanner stage 1 or 2 via purposive sampling. Intrinsic motivation and perceived stress were measured by self-report survey; morning salivary cortisol samples were taken to calculate cortisol awakening response to estimate biological stress reactivity. Results: Increased age was related to higher intrinsic motivation to engage in physical activity. Lower perceived stress and lower awakening cortisol response were associated with higher intrinsic motivation. Bootstrapped mediation results indicated perceived stress may be a pathway through which age impacts intrinsic motivation for physical activity. Conclusion: While motivation to engage in physical activity may increase with age, perceived stress may dampen this motivation, resulting in decreased physical activity. Interventions to help increase pre-adolescent girls’ engagement in active behaviors may benefit from reducing children’s perceptions of stress

Go Figure? Body-Shape Motives are Associated with Decreased Physical Activity Participation Among Midlife Women

1 This study was designed to investigate the relationship between midlife women's physical activity motives and their participation in physical activity. Cross-sectional qualitative and quantitative data were collected from 59 midlife women, most of whom were well-educated European-Americans (mean age = 45.6 years). Body-shape physical activity motives (i.e., motives related to toning, shaping, and weight loss) were compared with all other types of physical activity motives combined. Participants with body-shape motives were significantly less physically active than those with non-body-shape motives (p < .01). Negative affect toward physical activity was negatively associated with participation, but did not mediate the effect of physical activity motives on participation. Body Mass Index (BMI) was not related to physical activity motives or participation. Results suggest that body-shape motives might be associated with less physical activity participation than non-body-shape motives among midlife women

Objectively Measured Physical Activity Is Negatively Associated with Plasma Adiponectin Levels in Minority Female Youth

Objective. To evaluate the relationship between adiponectin and physical activity (PA) in minority female youth. Methods. Plasma adiponectin was measured in 39 females (mean age 9.2 ± 0.9 years; 30 Latina, 9 African-American; 56% overweight). PA was assessed by accelerometry. Mean minutes per day spent in daily PA (DPA) (≥3 metabolic equivalents (METs)), moderate PA (MPA)(4–7 METs), vigorous PA (VPA)(≥7 METs), and moderate-to-vigorous PA (MVPA)(≥4 METs) were calculated. The association between adiponectin and PA, controlling for age, fat weight, lean weight, and insulin sensitivity (SI) was analyzed using linear regression. Results. Adiponectin correlated with fat weight (r = −0.43, P < .01) and SI (r = 0.52, P < .01). Minutes spent in DPA (β = −0.40, P = .02), MPA (β = −0.36, P = .04), or MVPA (β = −0.37, P = .03) were predictors of adiponectin in the adjusted model. Conclusions. Higher PA levels were related to lower adiponectin levels. Potential mechanisms include upregulation of adiponectin receptors or an increase in high-molecular weight adiponectin with increasing PA

Prevalence and co-occurrence of addictive behaviors among former alternative high school youth

Abstract Background and Aims Recent work has studied multiple addictions using a matrix measure, which taps multiple addictions through single responses for each type. Methods The present study investigated use of a matrix measure approach among former alternative high school youth (average age = 19.8 years) at risk for addictions. Lifetime and last 30-day prevalence of one or more of 11 addictions reviewed in other work (Sussman, Lisha &amp; Griffiths, 2011) was the primary focus (i.e., cigarettes, alcohol, other/hard drugs, eating, gambling, Internet, shopping, love, sex, exercise, and work). Also, the co-occurrence of two or more of these 11 addictive behaviors was investigated. Finally, the latent class structure of these addictions, and their associations with other measures, was examined. Results We found that ever and last 30-day prevalence of one or more of these addictions was 79.2% and 61.5%, respectively. Ever and last 30-day co-occurrence of two or more of these addictions was 61.5% and 37.7%, respectively. Latent Class Analysis suggested two groups: a generally Non-addicted Group (67.2% of the sample) and a “Work Hard, Play Hard”-addicted Group that was particularly invested in addiction to love, sex, exercise, the Internet, and work. Supplementary analyses suggested that the single-response type self-reports may be measuring the addictions they intend to measure. Discussion and Conclusions We suggest implications of these results for future studies and the development of prevention and treatment programs, though much more validation research is needed on the use of this type of measure

Psychosocial correlates of eating behavior in children and adolescents: a review

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Understanding the correlates of dietary intake is necessary in order to effectively promote healthy dietary behavior among children and adolescents. A literature review was conducted on the correlates of the following categories of dietary intake in children and adolescents: Fruit, Juice and Vegetable Consumption, Fat in Diet, Total Energy Intake, Sugar Snacking, Sweetened Beverage Consumption, Dietary Fiber, Other Healthy Dietary Consumption, and Other Less Healthy Dietary Consumption in children and adolescents.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Cross-sectional and prospective studies were identified from PubMed, PsycINFO and PsycArticles by using a combination of search terms. Quantitative research examining determinants of dietary intake among children and adolescents aged 3–18 years were included. The selection and review process yielded information on country, study design, population, instrument used for measuring intake, and quality of research study.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Seventy-seven articles were included. Many potential correlates have been studied among children and adolescents. However, for many hypothesized correlates substantial evidence is lacking due to a dearth of research. The correlates best supported by the literature are: perceived modeling, dietary intentions, norms, liking and preferences. Perceived modeling and dietary intentions have the most consistent and positive associations with eating behavior. Norms, liking, and preferences were also consistently and positively related to eating behavior in children and adolescents. Availability, knowledge, outcome expectations, self-efficacy and social support did not show consistent relationships across dietary outcomes.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>This review examined the correlates of various dietary intake; Fruit, Juice and Vegetable Consumption, Fat in Diet, Total Energy Intake, Sugar Snacking, Sweetened Beverage Consumption, Dietary Fiber, Other Healthy Dietary Consumption, and Other Less Healthy Dietary Consumption in cross-sectional and prospective studies for children and adolescents. The correlates most consistently supported by evidence were perceived modeling, dietary intentions, norms, liking and preferences. More prospective studies on the psychosocial determinants of eating behavior using broader theoretical perspectives should be examined in future research.</p

Prevalence and co-occurrence of addictive behaviors among former alternative high school youth: A longitudinal follow-up study

Background and Aims Recent work has studied addictions using a matrix measure, which taps multiple addictions through single responses for each type. This is the first longitudinal study using a matrix measure. Methods We investigated the use of this approach among former alternative high school youth (average age = 19.8 years at baseline; longitudinal n = 538) at risk for addictions. Lifetime and last 30-day prevalence of one or more of 11 addictions reviewed in other work was the primary focus (i.e., cigarettes, alcohol, hard drugs, shopping, gambling, Internet, love, sex, eating, work, and exercise). These were examined at two time-points one year apart. Latent class and latent transition analyses (LCA and LTA) were conducted in Mplus. Results Prevalence rates were stable across the two time-points. As in the cross-sectional baseline analysis, the 2-class model (addiction class, non-addiction class) fit the data better at follow-up than models with more classes. Item-response or conditional probabilities for each addiction type did not differ between time-points. As a result, the LTA model utilized constrained the conditional probabilities to be equal across the two time-points. In the addiction class, larger conditional probabilities (i.e., 0.40–0.49) were found for love, sex, exercise, and work addictions; medium conditional probabilities (i.e., 0.17–0.27) were found for cigarette, alcohol, other drugs, eating, Internet and shopping addiction; and a small conditional probability (0.06) was found for gambling. Discussion and Conclusions Persons in an addiction class tend to remain in this addiction class over a one-year period

Behavior change interventions: the potential of ontologies for advancing science and practice

A central goal of behavioral medicine is the creation of evidence-based interventions for promoting behavior change. Scientific knowledge about behavior change could be more effectively accumulated using "ontologies." In information science, an ontology is a systematic method for articulating a "controlled vocabulary" of agreed-upon terms and their inter-relationships. It involves three core elements: (1) a controlled vocabulary specifying and defining existing classes; (2) specification of the inter-relationships between classes; and (3) codification in a computer-readable format to enable knowledge generation, organization, reuse, integration, and analysis. This paper introduces ontologies, provides a review of current efforts to create ontologies related to behavior change interventions and suggests future work. This paper was written by behavioral medicine and information science experts and was developed in partnership between the Society of Behavioral Medicine's Technology Special Interest Group (SIG) and the Theories and Techniques of Behavior Change Interventions SIG. In recent years significant progress has been made in the foundational work needed to develop ontologies of behavior change. Ontologies of behavior change could facilitate a transformation of behavioral science from a field in which data from different experiments are siloed into one in which data across experiments could be compared and/or integrated. This could facilitate new approaches to hypothesis generation and knowledge discovery in behavioral science