Sedentary Behaviour Psychology

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Sedentary Behaviour Psychology

• EPHE 348

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Sedentary?

• Pate, ONeill Lobelo (2008)
• Most of our knowledge does not tease out
  sedentary and light activity
• May be a huge factor for understanding health in
  the future
• Simple inactivity may not be adequate to
  understand the behaviour..(Biddle et al., 1999
  Sallis et al., 2004)

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Screen Time?
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Screen Viewing and Physical Inactivity
High prevalence but low correlation with physical
activity (Biddle et al., 2004)
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Issues?

• TV screen time has not changed since the 50s
  (Biddle et al., 2004)
• Many children are high active and high tech
• Subtle differences perhaps, but not convincing
  (Smith et al., 2008)

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Behavioural Choice Theory

• Work by Epstein Colleagues
• Behaviours may affect each other due to time
  displacement
• Reinforcing value (comparator of enjoyment)
• Proximity/avaialbility (comparator of ease)
• Results have been favorable for eating behaviours
  but less so with PA in children

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Cross-Behavioural Conflict in Adults?
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Issues

• Adults (aged 35-50 particularly) have limited
  true leisure time due to occupational, child
  support, marital, and domestic duties
• Time displacement seems most likely

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Early evidence

• Correlations between TV viewing PA (Epstein
  Roemmich, 2001 Gordon-Larsen, Nelson, Popkin,
  2004 Tucker, 1993)
• Preliminary evidence that competing leisure-time
  goals are related to lower PA (Gebhardt Maes,
  1998)
• Preference for sedentary behaviour was correlated
  (-) with PA (particularly enjoyment (Salmon,
  Owen, Crawford, Bauman, Sallis, 2003)

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Intentions to watch TV (Rhodes Blanchard, 2008)
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Cognitive Processes for TV(Rhodes, Blanchard
Bellows, 2008)
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How do we intervene

• Some rationale that PA interventions should
  consider sedentary behaviour control (no solid
  evidence yet)
• Time displacement may need to be a focus
  (dropping some habits for others or combining
  behaviours)

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Motives for leisure-Time Activities

• Rhodes Dean (in press)
• TPB framework with 2 samples (population and
  undergraduate)
• TV and Computer use predicted by attitudes via
  intention
• No contribution of norms or perceived control

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Demotion of Sedentary Behaviour?

• Structural
• Social
• Social Cognitive
• Future research needed