Effects Of Brief Self Regulation Trainings Aimed At Increasing Physical Activity Among Master Students In Health Psychology And In Their Volunteer Trainees

Competence in helping people to change their life styles through brief interventions based on sound psychological models can meet important societal needs (Maes and Karoly 2005). Students attending an 11 weeks course participated in a weekly laboratory in which they were trained to practice on themselves a self management program with integrated techniques. Students worked on their SMART goal in couples and trained each other following the CALO-RE model (Mitchi et al 2011). Each student was required to recruit 2 volunteers who might benefit from increasing their own PA with the help of their counselling and supervision. At random one of the two volunteers received the treatment (trainee) with a delay of 1-2 weeks, while the other served as a waiting list control. Before starting the trainings students and volunteers completed a questionnaire that assessed emotional well-being, self-efficacy, self-determination style and physical activity levels with reference to the previous month. After 10-8 weeks, the students and the volunteers completed again a retrospective questionnaire. A total of 95 questionnaires completed at T1 were used to assess reliability and validity of the measures. Valid questionnaires completed pre and post the intervention by 21 students, 23 trainees and 18 controls have been analysed. Among the students statistical analyses reveal a significant decrease of anxiety and in perceived fatigue. After 8 weeks the trainees reported to be more engaged in pursuing their PA goal and closer to achieve it. The majority in control group reported to have renounced to their physical goal, while trainees reported a persisting committed to their aims. However all participants reported a decrease in the levels of PA. The failure to increase PA can be due to the fact that the programmes were conducted in the fall.