acting on the national physical activity guidelines Essay -- essays res

Acting on the National Physical Activity Guidelines Introduction The purpose of this study was to identify if presenting a sedentary individual with the Australian governments National Physical Activity Guidelines (NPAG) would improve their overall physical activity. There was a structured interview which was conducted at 2 week intervals. The interview assessed the subject current physical activity levels and their willingness to be able to incorporate physical activity into there daily lives while following the guidelines suggested. The NPAG guidelines were presented before each interview and explained to the subject. Additional surveys were conducted to evaluate the subject’s anxiety levels and self-efficacy. Throughout the study we could benefit by seeing if presenting a sedentary individual with the NPAG would help improve levels of fitness and see if the governments’ intervention would help the Australian population. Methods This study was conducted on a sedentary 48 year old Canadian woman. The details of the study were presented and an informed consent was gained from the participant. The interviews were conducted over the phone, since the subject is currently living in Canada. The first structured interview (see appendix 1) was conducted and then the physical activity guidelines were presented. Being unable to physically present the pamphlet to the subject the researcher had her access them via the internet (Australian Gouvernment, 1999). As the subject reviewed the guidelines the researcher explained them and ask the subject to choose 1 or more of the guidelines that she felt she could incorporate into her daily life. At this stage a general self-efficacy scale was administered. The survey consists of 10 simple questions aimed at finding if the subject had a high or low self-efficacy. Self-efficacy is described as being ones belief in their ability to organize and execute the sources of action requir ed to manage prospective situations (Albert Bandura, 1986). A third and final survey was administered and measured the subject’s proactive attitude levels, meaning the subjects beliefs about their ability to carry out a course of action through personal motivation. This questionnaire consisted of 8 short questions where the subject had to answer by; 1) not true at all, 2) barely true, 3) moderately true or 4) exactly true. http://www.fuberlin.de/ge... ...bsp;  Ã‚  Ã‚  Retrived March 15th 2005   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  From: http://www.healthactive.gov.au Crawford, S., Erklund, R.C., (1994), ‘Social Physique anxiety, reasons for exercise, and attitudes towards exercise settings’, Journal of Sport and exercise psychology, 16, 70-82. Dzewaltowski, D. A., Noble, J. M., & Shaw, J. M. (1990). Physical activity participation: Social cognitive theory versus the theories of reasoned action and planned behavior. Journal of Sport & Exercise Psychology, 12, 388-405. Hart, E.A., Leary, M.R., Rejeski, W.J., (1989), â€Å"The measurement of social physique anxiety†, Journal of sport and exercise psychology, 11, 94-104. Ralf Schwarzer, & Matthias Jerusalem (1993), General Self-efficacy scale   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Retrived March 14th 2005 From: http://www.fu-berlin.de/gesund/skalen/Language_Selection/Turkish/General_Perceived_Self-Efficac/general_perceived_self-efficac.htm Ralf Schwarzer (1999), Proactive Attitude Scale   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Retrived March 14th 2005   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  From:http://www.fuerlin.de/gesund/skalen/Language_Selection/Turkish/Proactive_Attitude/proactive_attitude.htm