Exercise adherence in sedentary university employees after an 8-week web-based intervention

Worksite health promotion has received attention from many researchers in an effort to find cost effective ways to improve employee health. If a simple web-based intervention is found to increase exercise adherence among sedentary adults, it may be a useful tool in improving the health of the workforce. PURPOSE: The purpose of the study was to investigate the effect of a web-based intervention on biometric measures related to exercise adherence, as well as the Stage of Change in sedentary university employees over an eight week period. METHODS: Thirty three sedentary adults were recruited from WWU university staff and faculty to participate in an eight week study. A treatment group (N=22) received access to a web portal for tracking physical activity and attended four bi-weekly workshops on starting a new exercise program, and a control group (N=11) which received no treatment. Both groups were tested pre and post intervention for body mass index, waist to hip ratio, six minute walk test, weekly physical activity levels and Stage of Change. The study design was a mixed ANOVA with one repeated factor (time) and one fixed factor (intervention), with an alpha level of 0.05. RESULTS: The results revealed a significant difference in Stage of Change in the treatment group over time. The treatment group moved from a Stage of Change score of 3.4 ± 0.9 before the intervention, and increased to 3.7 ± 0.9 after the 8 week intervention, while the control group averaged 3.0 ± 0.1 before the intervention and averaged 3.1 ± 0.1 post-intervention. There was a significant difference between the two groups in the post test (F[1,30]=7.895, p= 0.009). However, no other variables reached statistical significance between groups or over time. CONCLUSIONS: The web-based intervention was not effective in increasing changing biometric measures associated with exercise adherence among sedentary university employees