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The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of perceived activity choice upon the frequency of exercise behavior of adult women. Thirty‐six recent enrollees in a private health club were recruited for involvement in a new exercise program. At an initial organizational meeting, subjects ranked their preferences for different activities and completed a number of self‐report inventories. Subjects were paired on the basis of their activity preferences so as to establish two matched groups of subjects. One member of each pair was then randomly assigned to a choice condition while the other was assigned to a no choice control condition. Perceived choice was manipulated at the time of an individual's next visit to the club, with subjects in the choice group being led to believe that their initial activity selections were the basis for their programs whereas subjects in the control group were informed that they had been assigned a standardized exercise program by the club's instructresses. The overall attendance of the choice group was better than that of the control group. Across both groups there was a significant decline in attendance over the 6‐week period but the decrement was significantly greater in the control group. At the conclusion of the 6‐week period, subjects in the choice condition expressed a greater intention to continue exercising at the club than did subjects in the control condition.

A 10-item Thurstonian paired comparison inventory pertaining to factors underlying sport enjoyment was administered to 822 youth sport participants. The sample included participants at four age levels (7-8, 9-10, 11-12, and 13-14 years) from the three sports, soccer (n = 330), baseball (n = 176), and hockey (n = 343). Considerable consistency was found across both sport and age levels in the relative importance of the different enjoyment factors. Factors that were interpreted as being intrinsic to the sport activity (excitement of the sport, personal accomplishment, improving one's skills, testing skills against others, and just doing the skills) were consistently rated as being most important, whereas more extrinsic or outcome-related factors (pleasing others, winning rewards, winning the game) were consistently rated least important of the 10 factors. The social items “being on a team” and “being with friends” were consistently of intermediate importance. The results are interpreted in terms of contemporary views of intrinsic motivation, and suggestions are offered both for future research and for youth sport practice.

The interpersonal relationships of older adults have long been recognized as important determinants for their physical activity involvement. To date, researchers in this field have tended to focus on positive social influences, such as social support. Furthermore, in most studies, operational definitions of social support have stressed the source of the support (e.g., family support and friend support) rather than the nature of the support provided by these groups and individuals. In order to clarify the social context of physical activity among older adults, more attention should be paid to exploring both positive and negative social influences on physical activity. The objectives of this paper were to consolidate current findings concerning social influences and physical activity among aging adults, and to identify major positive and negative social influences from the literature that are associated with physical activity and health-promoting behaviors among aging adults. The development of a more comprehensive and representative method of measuring social influences in physical activity settings is advocated.