Motivating People to be Physically Active: Self‐Persuasion vs. Balanced Decision Making¹

Abstract

Female members of an adult physical fitness club, who had been inactive for a period of at least one month, were assigned to one of four treatment groups. A control group received no treatment while the other three groups underwent different treatments during a telephone interview. A regular call‐up group received a standard club telephone interview advocating greater participation in the club's activities; a decision‐balance‐sheet group completed a list of anticipated gains and losses for attending the club's activities; a positive‐outcomes‐only group (i.e., self‐persuasion condition) completed a list of anticipated gains for attending the club's activities. Attendance rates for both the decision balance‐sheet group and the self‐persuasion group were better than for the control group. Also, attendance for the self‐persuasion group was significantly better than for the regular club call‐up group, Results are discussed in terms of self‐persuasion and emotional inoculation processes with respect to behavioral change and behavioral maintenance.

Reframing the dilemma of poor attendance at cardiac rehabilitation: an exploration of ambivalence and the decisional balance

“…The authors suggested the process of self‐persuasion, whereby a person becomes aware of more positive incentives that outweigh the negative incentives for carrying out a given course of action (in this case, attending the exercise class), was likely to have accounted for the positive effect seen in the relevant decisional balance group (Hoyt & Janis 1975). Similar findings were reported by Wankel and Thompson (1977) in a study designed to motivate attendance of inactive members of a physical fitness club and Colten and Janis (1982), who studied the effects of completing, or not completing, a decisional balance which explored the pros and cons of going versus not going on a recommended 1 200‐calorie diet.…”

The use of implementation intentions and the decision balance sheet in promoting exercise behaviour

“…The procedure was similar to that used in the Wankel and Thompson (1977) study. Respondents were asked to think of and record the anticipated gains and losses, which may arise from their exercising two more sessions per week.…”

“…The DBS has been shown on several occasions to be effective in improving exercise participation and adherence (e.g. Hoyt & Janis, 1975;Wankel & Thompson, 1977;Wankel et al, 1985). Therefore comparing the comparative success of the DBS against implementation intentions alone or used in conjunction with the DBS, would represent a more stringent test of the efficacy of implementation intentions.…”

Health Locus of Control Predicts Free-Living, but Not Supervised, Physical Activity: A Test of Exercise-Specific Control and Outcome-Expectancy Hypotheses

“…Theabsenceof a relationship betweeninternalhealthlocusof control and supervised running is less remarkable because small supervised exercise programs permit effective interventions employing more client-centered approaches using behavior modification and cognitive-behavior modification techniques. Several effective exercise interventions in supervisedsettingshavebeen basedin parton decisiontheories that includeroles for perceivedbehavioral control,outcomeexpectancy values,andperceivedbarriersforactivity (Belisle, Roskies, & Levesque, 1987;Hoyt & Janis, 1975;King & Frederiksen, 1984;Marlatt & Gordon, 1985;Martin et al, 1984;Wankel & Thompson, 1977;Wankel, Yardley, & Graham, 1985).…”