How can we help sedentary people become active?
My main research question focuses on how we can get sedentary individuals, particularly those at high risk for bad health outcomes, to be more active. It turns out that most (about 60%) high-risk individuals choose walking as their preferred mode of physical activity. However, because walking is a behavior that is accumulated in small bouts throughout the day, it is difficult for most people to accurately recall how much walking they have done in a day. The theory of self-regulation tells us that if you cannot accurately self-monitor a behavior, you are unlikely to be successful at changing the behavior. Pedometers, devices that count steps taken throughout the day, help people self-monitor walking. Enhanced pedometers upload time stamped step-count data to a computer, thus providing more detailed walking feedback with a significantly decreased user burden. My goal is to design an effective web based application to deliver a walking intervention to for sedentary individuals who are at high risk for adverse cardiovascular events using enhanced pedometer feedback. By adding an eCommunity feel to the web-based intervention, I hope to increase long-term adherence to the program.
posted by Caroline R. Richardson, MD at 9:42 PM
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