The Effect of Social Support on Exercise Behavior in Older Adults

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to test the relationship among social supports related to exercise (family, friends, and expert support), self-efficacy expectations, outcome expectations, and exercise behavior in a sample of older adults living in a continuing care retirement community. The sample included 74 older adults with a mean age of 85.6 +/- 5.5. Path analysis using Amos 4.0 was done. The model fit the data (chi-square = 4.6, df = 3, p = .21, normed fit index of .99, relative fit index of .98, and root mean square error of approximation of .08) and explained 53% of the variance in exercise behavior. Five of the seven hypothesized paths in the model were statistically significant. Friend support indirectly influenced exercise through self-efficacy and outcome expectations. This suggests interventions to improve exercise behavior in older adults should incorporate social supports to strengthen self-efficacy and outcome expectations related to exercise.

Employment status and differences in physical activity behavior during times of economic hardship: results of a population-based study

“…In the view of the authors, interventions aimed to improve exercise behavior in adults and especially older adults should incorporate social support to strengthen self-efficacy expectation outcomes. [36] We found that smoking was not statistically significantly associated with physical activity. However, other studies have reported that, compared with inactive individuals, physically active individuals smoked fewer cigarettes and were more likely to be nonsmokers or occasional smokers.…”

“…[33] Concerning social support, several studies have found it to be associated with levels of physical activity. [35,36] For instance, Resnick et al reported that friends support indirectly influenced exercise through self-efficacy and outcome. In the view of the authors, interventions aimed to improve exercise behavior in adults and especially older adults should incorporate social support to strengthen self-efficacy expectation outcomes.…”

Short-term effects of social encouragement on exercise behavior: insights from China's Wanbu network

“…The main finding, that social interactions help increase an individual's exercise level on the next day, is consistent with previous research on the health benefits of social encouragement. 6,8,9,12,17,18 This finding suggests that individual exercisers should be encouraged to interact more with their peers in exercise-related social networks such as Wanbu. It is worth noting that only 1.18% (5010/ 426,000) of the Wanbu participants had any social interactions at all during the study period, which suggests that increased social interactions could have a large positive impact on this community.…”

The role of social capital and community belongingness for exercise adherence: An exploratory study of the CrossFit gym model

“…Interventions to improve exercise adherence have often focused on influencing individual motivations, using theoretical models such as Self-Determination Theory (Deci and Ryan, 2002). Selfefficacy had been identified as a key factor for predicting (Flora et al, 2015) and improving exercise adherence (Buckley, 2014;McAuley and Blissmer, 2000), with studies demonstrating the positive impact of social support on self-efficacy (Resnick et al, 2002) and ultimately on levels of exercise adherence (Cooper et al, 2015). Nevertheless, to the researchers' knowledge no research has considered how the contextual environment and ethos of the gym itself may encourage social support.…”