Stages of exercise behavior change and perceived exercise benefits barriers among university students

1. Stages of Exercise Behavior Change and Perceived
Exercise Benefits/Barriers among University
Students
Yıldırım, A., Taş, H., Hürmeriç-Altunsöz, I.
Middle East Technical University

2. Introduction
 The health benefits of physical activity (PA) participation are well-documented in
many systematic reviews (Warburton, & Bredin, 2017).
 The World Health Organization recommends that "adults should do at least 150–
300 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic PA" (Bull, et al., 2020, p. 1456).
 However, sedentary behaviors are prevalent in many societies. Significantly,
individuals' PA level decreases during university years (Small, Bailey-Davis, Morgan,
& Maggs, 2013).

3. Introduction
 It is crucial to find ways to support the PA level of university students.
Transtheoretical model is a useful framework for understanding individuals'
behavior changes in healthy habits (Kohl, Murroy, & Salvo, 2019).
 This model indicates that individuals follow a series of stages: precontemplation,
contemplation, preparation, action, and maintenance (Marcus & Lewis, 2003).
 Corbin and his colleagues (2014) emphasize that the main aim is to support
individuals progress to the last stage, which might be challenging.

4. Purpose of the study
 To examine the relationship between stages of exercise behavior change and
perceived exercise benefits/behaviors among university students.
 To examine PA and screen time behaviors among the students.

5. Research Questions
1. What is the relationship between stages of exercise behavior change and perceived
exercise benefits/barriers among university students?
2. What is the role of physical activity participation on stages of exercise behavior
change and perceived exercise benefits/barriers among university students?

6. Methods
 This study utilized a descriptive and correlational research design.
 Participants were selected by using a purposeful sampling method.
 66 undergraduate students participated in the study voluntarily (Female = 22, Male
= 44).

7. Methods
Instrumentation
 Exercise Benefits/Barriers Scale (EBBS) (Sechrist, Walker, & Pender, 1987)
 Turkish adaptation of the EBBS was done by Ortabağ, Ceylan, Akyüz, and Bebiş (2010)
 Exercise Stages of Change Questionnaire (ESOCQ) (Marcus & Lewis, 2003)
 Turkish adaptation of ESOCQ was performed by Cengiz, Aşçı, and İnce (2010)
 A demographic information sheet

8. Methods
Data analysis
 Data were analyzed with descriptive and inferential statistics using SPSS 26.
Inferential analysis
 Chi-square test for independence correlation.
 A point-biserial correlation
 An independent t-test

9. Results
The study results revealed that
 30 students do regular PA
 36 of them do not do regular PA
When considering their stages of change results,
 4 students are in precontemplation stage,
 25 students are in contemplation stage
 13 of them are in preparation stage
 8 of them are in action stage
 16 students are in maintenance stage.

10. Results
The study results revealed that
 Regular PA participation is significantly related to stages of change levels χ2 (4) =
43.207, p < .05.
 It is found a positive correlation between stages of change and students' score in
the exercise benefits/barriers scale (rpb = .304, n = 66, p <.05).
 Students participating in regular PA (M = 138.53, SD= 12.69) had high score in the
exercise benefits scale than the students who do not (M = 129.86, SD= 15.57), t
(64) = -2.448, p <.05, r2 = .08.

11. Conclusion
 These findings might be useful to create policies in order to track university
students’ perceptions about physical activity and their stages of exercise behavior
change.
 Physical activity interventions might be provided as a further step to increase
university students’ physical activity level based on the physical activity strategy for
the WHO European Region 2016–2025 (WHO, 2016) on university campuses.

12. References
 Bull F. C, Al-Ansari S. S., Biddle, S., et al., (2020). World Health Organization 2020 guidelines on physical activity and sedentary behavior.
British Journal of Sports Medicine, 54, 1451-1462.
 Cengiz, C., Așçı, F. H., & İnce, M. L. (2010). Exercise Stages of Change Questionnaire: Its reliability and validity. Türkiye Klinikleri Spor
Bilimleri, 2(1), 32-37.
 Corbin, C. B., McConnell, K., Le Masurier, G., Corbin, D., & Farrar, T. (2014). Health opportunities through physical education. Champaign,
IL: Human Kinetics.
 Kohl III, H., Murray, T., & Salvo, D. (2019). Foundations of physical activity and public health. Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics Publishers.
 Marcus, B. H., & Lewis, B. A. (2003). Physical Activity and the Stages of Motivational Readiness for Change Model. President's Council on
Physical Fitness and Sports Research Digest, 1-10.
 Ortabağ, T., Ceylan, S., Akyüğz, A., & Bebiş, H. (2010). The validity and reliability of the exercise benefits/barriers scale for Turkish Military
nursing students. South African Journal for Research in Sport, Physical Education and Recreation, 32(2), 55-70.
 Sechrist, K. R., Walker, S. N., & Pender, N. J. (1987). Development and psychometric evaluation of the exercise benefits/barriers scale.
Research in Nursing & Health, 10(6), 357-365.
 Small, M., Bailey-Davis, L., Morgan, N., & Maggs, J. (2013). Changes in eating and physical activity behaviors across seven semesters of
college: Living on or off campus matters. Health Education & Behavior: The Official Publication of the Society for Public Health
Education, 40(4), 435-41.
 Warburton, D. E., & Bredin, S. S. (2017). Health benefits of physical activity: A systematic review of current systematic reviews. Current
Opinion in Cardiology, 32(5), 541-556.
 World Health Organization. (2016). Physical activity strategy for the WHO European Region 2016-2025 from
https://www.euro.who.int/__data/assets/pdf_file/0014/311360/Physical-activity-strategy-2016-2025.pdf.