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Schedule patterns influence exercise frequency, duration
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Adults who stick to a regular exercise schedule engage in more frequent and longer workout sessions than those who do not, according to findings published in Obesity.
“There is a need to better understand how underlying markers of habit relate to [physical activity] behavior and can be leveraged to facilitate [physical activity] habit formation and maintenance,” Dale S. Bond, PhD, associate professor of psychiatry and human behavior at The Miriam Hospital and the Warren Alpert Medical School at Brown University, and colleagues wrote. “Strong cue-behavior associations increase the habitual nature and automaticity (ie, performance with lowered conscious awareness or volition) of [physical activity], thus reducing the day-to-day attention, effort and motivation required to perform [physical activity].”
Bond and colleagues assessed exercise patterns in 375 participants from the National Weight Control Registry (mean age, 53.4 years; 64.8% women). All participants avoided regaining the weight for at least a year after losing at least 30 lb, according to the researchers. Questionnaires were used to assess how often, when and for how long participants exercised, as well as “cue consistency” and “exercise automaticity.”
Those who exercised in the same time frame on more than 50% of the days they exercised each week were considered “temporally consistent” exercisers, according to the researchers, who noted that 68% of the participants fulfilled the criterion.
These exercisers worked out 4.8 days per week while those who were less consistent exercised 4.4 days per week (P = .007). The more regular exercisers logged an average of 350 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity, and the less regular group averaged 285 minutes (P = .03). The researchers also found that 86.3% of those who were temporally consistent worked out for at least 150 minutes per week while 74.2% of those who were less regular reached this threshold (P = .004).
Nearly half of the participants who were considered temporarily consistent worked out between 4 a.m. and 8:59 a.m. each day (47.8%) whereas 25.1% worked out between 5 p.m. and 3:59 a.m.
According to the researchers, participants who reported exercising on more days had higher scores on the exercise automaticity (P < .001) and cue consistency questionnaires (P < .001), which included items for type of exercise (P < .001), location (P < .01), timing (P < .001), duration (P < .001) and mood (P < .01). In addition, the researchers noted that higher scores for exercise automaticity and cue consistency in duration and timing of workouts were associated with how many minutes were spent exercising each week (P < .001 for all).
“Research on habit-based aspects of [physical activity] is important given that many traditional theories of health behavior change and past [physical activity] interventions have paid relatively limited attention to nonconscious influences on [physical activity],” the researchers wrote. “Taken together, our findings suggest that exercising at the same time of day, regardless of whether it is during the morning, afternoon or evening, may help with achieving higher [physical activity] levels.” – by Phil Neuffer
Disclosures: The authors report no relevant financial disclosures.
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