Child weight issues can be emotionally challenging for parents. The purpose of this study was to examine how parents’ ability to manage negative emotions may facilitate parenting self-efficacy and healthy parenting behaviors (e.g., providing healthy food for a child). In this study, parents ( N = 159) of a 6–12-year-old child completed a health-specific parenting self-efficacy questionnaire and retrospectively reported their child’s daily servings of fruits and vegetables and sweets and soda. They also completed a parental emotion regulation task where they viewed film clips of families struggling with child weight challenges. During this task, parents managed their emotions by either positively reframing the situation to feel less negative (down-regulate negative emotions) or negatively reframing the situation to feel more negative (up-regulate negative emotions). We tested a mediation model examining the relations among parent emotion regulation, parenting self-efficacy, and child dietary habits. Results revealed that parents’ ability to down-regulate negative emotions was associated with lower parenting self-efficacy, which in turn was associated with greater sweets and soda consumption among children. In contrast, parents’ ability to up-regulate negative emotions was directly associated with lower sweets and soda consumption, regardless of parenting self-efficacy. Our findings have implications for healthcare practice and child weight interventions as they underscore the importance of helping parents consider the consequences of childhood obesity to encourage healthy eating behavior in families.

Physical activity offers substantial mind-body health benefits and reduced mortality, yet many individuals are chronically underactive. Physical activity interventions may benefit from integrative approaches that join components of mindfulness and neurobiological models of behavior. Mindfulness increases one’s awareness of cognitions and physical sensations to potentially facilitate self-regulation, while neurobiological models such as the dual system model of health behavior offer guidance on improving physical activity intervention targets. This 2-phase study includes an initial development process to create brief (∼4 min) mindfulness informed guided imagery audio files that target distinct cognitive and affective processes to promote physical activity. In the second phase, participants completed a 2-week pilot intervention study to gather qualitative and quantitative data on intervention feasibility and acceptability. Participants endorsed the mindfulness informed guided imagery as easy to use, enjoyable and helpful. Over a 2-week intervention period participants reported positive shifts in behavior change, physical activity enjoyment, increased mindfulness during physical activity, and increased physical exercise self-efficacy and satisfaction. Interview data revealed that participants increased their frequency of physical activity and tended to experience positive affect during physical activity, engaged in future oriented thinking and were able to view physical activity in a more positive light. Findings support the feasibility and acceptability of an integrative online mindfulness informed guided imagery intervention to promote physical activity enjoyment and engagement. This study extends health behavior change intervention research and provides supporting evidence for a flexible and tailorable online mindfulness-based intervention.

BACKGROUND Insufficient physical activity is associated with various health risks; however, most current physical activity interventions have critical barriers to scalability. Delivering interventions via technology and identifying active and inert components in early-phase development are ways to build more efficient and scalable interventions. We developed a novel intervention to promote physical activity that targets three brief guided thinking tasks (i.e., episodic future thinking [EFT], positive affective imagery [PAI], planning), separately and in combination, using brief audio-recordings. OBJECTIVE The aim of the GeT (Guided Thinking) Active study is to optimize a scalable guided thinking intervention to promote physical activity, using principles of the Multiphase Optimization Strategy (MOST). Mechanism-focused analyses will inform which components are optimal candidates for inclusion in an intervention package and which need refinement. METHODS We will enroll 192 participants randomized to receive intervention components delivered via an audio-recording that they will listen to prior to weekly in-lab physical activity sessions. Participants in the high dose conditions will also be instructed to listen to the audio-recording on four additional days during each week. We will evaluate effects of the components on physical activity over 6 weeks in a 2 (EFT vs. recent thinking) x 2 (PAI vs. neutral imagery) x 2 (Planning vs. no planning) x 2 (dose: 5x/week vs. 1x/week) full factorial randomized trial. RESULTS The National Cancer Institute funded this study (R21CA260360) on May 13, 2021. Participant recruitment began in February 2022. Data analysis will begin after the completion of data collection. CONCLUSIONS The GeT Active study will result in a scalable, audio-recorded intervention that will accelerate progress toward the full development of guided thinking interventions to promote physical activity. CLINICALTRIAL ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT05235360

Background Insufficient physical activity is associated with various health risks; however, most current physical activity interventions have critical barriers to scalability. Delivering interventions via technology and identifying active and inert components in early-phase development are ways to build more efficient and scalable interventions. We developed a novel intervention to promote physical activity that targets 3 brief guided thinking tasks, separately and in combination, using brief audio recordings: (1) episodic future thinking (EFT), (2) positive affective imagery (PAI), and (3) planning. Objective The aim of this GeT (Guided Thinking) Active study is to optimize a scalable guided thinking intervention to promote physical activity using principles of the Multiphase Optimization Strategy (MOST). Mechanism-focused analyses will inform which components are optimal candidates for inclusion in an intervention package and which need refinement. Methods We will enroll 192 participants randomized to receive intervention components delivered via an audio recording that they will listen to prior to weekly in-lab physical activity sessions. Participants in the high dose conditions will also be instructed to listen to the audio recording 4 additional days each week. We will evaluate effects of the components on physical activity over 6 weeks in a 2 (EFT vs recent thinking) × 2 (PAI vs neutral imagery) × 2 (planning vs no planning) × 2 (dose: 5×/week vs 1×/week) full factorial randomized trial. Results The National Cancer Institute funded this study (R21CA260360) on May 13, 2021. Participant recruitment began in February 2022. Data analysis will begin after the completion of data collection. Conclusions The GeT Active study will result in a scalable, audio-recorded intervention that will accelerate progress toward the full development of guided thinking interventions to promote physical activity. Trial Registration ClinicalTrials.gov NCT05235360; https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT05235360 International Registered Report Identifier (IRRID) DERR1-10.2196/40908