Invited Guest Editorial: Envisioning the next fifty years of research on the exercise–affect relationship

Should I exercise or sleep to feel better? A daily analysis with physically active working mothers

“…Results support the positive and strong relationship between physical activity and positive mood (Ekkekakis, Hargreaves, & Parfitt, 2013;Stanton, Happell, Hayman, Reaburn, & Schuch, 2014) and are in line with previous research (Maher et al, 2013). In a recent study with middle-aged Australian women, the likelihood of depressive symptoms in women who sat more than 7 h per day and did no physical activity was triple that of women who sat less or equal to 4 h and who met physical activity guidelines (van Uffelen et al, 2013).…”

Predictors of Physical Activity Change Among Adults Using Observational Designs

“…For example, the processes of change results support the tenets behind models such as the health action process approach [120], the multi-process action control model [118], and obviously the transtheoretical model [21] where regulatory behaviors are considered essential to move from a decision to act to actual behavioral adoption. The relationship between affective judgments and adoption supports self-determination theory [121], the multi-process action control model [118], and other hedonic models of PA [122] where feeling states and pleasure are considered central to behavioral enactment. When taken into consideration with the positive predictive effects on PA for those with greater affective responses during exercise, this review clearly suggests that making exercise enjoyable/pleasurable is an important target for intervention.…”

“…When taken into consideration with the positive predictive effects on PA for those with greater affective responses during exercise, this review clearly suggests that making exercise enjoyable/pleasurable is an important target for intervention. Behavioral theories that favor cognitive over affective determinants of behavior, such as social cognitive theory [123], theory of planned behavior [98], and protection motivation theory [112], or pure social or environmental models, may have limited utility in PA adoption [122].…”

Distance-dependent Association of Affect with Pacing Strategy in Cycling Time Trials

“…Positive emotions have been associated with goal attainment and negative emotions with goal failure, thus ratings of self-efficacy, which convey the level of confidence in achieving the task outcome, may influence the goal-directed regulation of exercise intensity (35). Affective valence (9) and effort perception (15) are moderated by different exercise domains (i.e. modality, intensity and duration) and between self-paced and fixed-intensity exercise, hence there is a need for future research to explore the roles of affect and self-efficacy in the decision-making processes involved in pacing strategies during self-paced exercise.…”

“…modality, intensity and duration) and between self-paced and fixed-intensity exercise, hence there is a need for future research to explore the roles of affect and self-efficacy in the decision-making processes involved in pacing strategies during self-paced exercise. Furthermore, whilst an intensity-dependent affect-exercise relationship has been theorised (9,21), less is known about the implications of this relationship in self-paced exercise of varying distances.…”