Increasing physical activity and decreasing sedentary behaviour in older adults: Examining the effects of trending norms on intentions and behaviour
Date
2022-09-02
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
ORCID
Type
Thesis
Degree Level
Masters
Abstract
The aging population in Canada is increasing, and with this increase, comes a corresponding increase in chronic diseases (Roberts et al., 2015). Among aging Canadians, two predictors of chronic disease development are physical inactivity and sedentarism – both of which are pervasive in society (Prince et al., 2020; Ross et al., 2020). As humans are social beings
(Baumeister & Leary, 1995), one possible way to target a change in these behaviours is using social norms (Cialdini et al., 1990). The purpose of the current study was to examine whether trending norms (i.e., a minority norm that is increasing, Mortensen et al., 2019) would influence older adults’ intentions and behaviours with respect to increasing physical activity and decreasing sedentary behaviour. Using an experimental design, older adults were randomly assigned to one of three message conditions: trending norm (an increasing number of older adults are increasing their walking and decreasing their sitting, n=20), trending norm with outcome expectation (an increasing number of older adults are increasing their walking and decreasing their sitting and are getting health benefits from the behaviour changes, n=28), or attention control (more older adults are increasing their hobbies, n=25). Results from a MANOVA revealed a significant omnibus main effect for messages on reported intention, Wilks’ lambda F (4, 138) = 2.50, p = .045, ηp2 = .07. Follow up ANOVAs revealed that intention to decrease sedentary behaviour was significant, F (2, 70) = 4.03, p = .022, ηp2 = .10. Pairwise comparisons with Bonferroni correction examining intention to decrease sedentary behaviour revealed that those exposed to the trending norm combined with the outcome expectation reported a greater intention to decrease sedentary behaviour than those in the control condition (p = .038). No significant differences emerged between message conditions when examining physical activity or sedentary behaviours. These results provide preliminary experimental evidence that trending norm messages may serve to increase older adults’ intentions to decrease sedentary behaviour, but no evidence was provided to support trending norms increasing physical activity or decreasing sedentary behaviour.
Description
Keywords
trending norm, physical inactivity, sedentary behaviour
Citation
Degree
Master of Science (M.Sc.)
Department
Kinesiology
Program
Kinesiology