Abstract:Recent research revealed that on days when college students engage in more physical activity than is typical for them, they also experience greater satisfaction with life (SWL). That work relied on self-reported physical activity and did not differentiate between low levels of physical activity and sedentary behavior. This study was designed to (1) determine if the association between self-reported physical activity and SWL would exist when physical activity was monitored objectively and (2) examine the between-and within-person associations among physical activity, sedentary behavior, and SWL. During a 14-day ecological momentary assessment study, college students (N = 128) wore an accelerometer to objectively measure physical activity and sedentary behavior, and they self-reported their physical activity, sedentary behavior, and SWL at the end of each day. Physical activity and sedentary behavior had additive, within-person associations with SWL across self-reported and objective-measures of behavior. Strategies to promote daily well-being should encourage college students to incorporate greater amounts of physical activity as well as limit their sedentary behavior.
Keywords: well-being | exercise | sitting | accelerometer | college students
Article:Satisfaction with life (SWL) has a variety of important consequences, including decreased depressive symptoms and worry, increased workplace productivity, and greater longevity (Diener & Chan, 2011;Lyubomirsky, King, & Diener, 2005). Given the many outcomes associated with SWL, it would be valuable to better understand factors, such as physical activity and sedentary behavior, that influence SWL. This investigation is especially relevant for the college student population because people's global evaluations of their well-being appear to worsen more from ages 18 to 25 years than during any other time in the adult lifespan (Stone, Schwartz, Broderick, & Deaton, 2010). The level and intensity of physical activity also decline during this age range and those changes may help to explain the simultaneous decline in SWL.
Satisfaction With Life and Physical ActivitySubjective well-being is commonly conceptualized as "happiness" and incorporates both affective (i.e., pleas-ant and unpleasant emotions) and evaluative (i.e., SWL) components (Diener, 1984(Diener, , 2000. Influences on SWL can be framed as either between-or within-person, with between-person influences reflecting dispositional (i.e., time-invariant, trait-level) correlates of SWL and within-person influences reflecting the effect of time-varying factors, including daily life events, behaviors, or states, on SWL (Diener, 1984). Although between-and within-person factors both represent viable influences on SWL, the majority of research concerning factors that influence SWL has emphasized between-person influences and within-person influences have received limited attention.Physical activity is a behavior that may exert either a between-or within-person influence on SWL. Much of the evidence for an assoc...