Increasing autonomous motivation for physical activity among adolescents

Purpose: Adolescents need at least 60 min of physical activity (PA) every day. Yet, the number of minutes of daily PA steadily decreases from childhood through adolescence. This occurs despite evidence that high levels of PA and limited minutes of sedentary behavior (SB) decrease the incidence of heart disease, type 2 diabetes mellitus, obesity, and cancer. Motivational interviewing (MI) is a behavioral counseling technique that focuses on behavior change areas, such as diet and PA. This research aimed to evaluate a brief nurse-led virtual MI (vMI) intervention to guide youth toward increased PA compared to an attention control group. Design and Methods: Participants completed the Behavioral Regulation in Exercise Questionnaire (BREQ-2) and wore an ActiGraph GT3X+ accelerometer on their dominant wrist for 8 days to operationalize SB and PA. Participants in the treatment group rec an individual vMI session, while attention-control group participants received an individual education session. All participants received follow-up calls from the researcher or assistant at Weeks 4 and 8. During the calls, those in the treatment group received follow-up MI, while the control group asked follow-up questions about information received during the education session. At 12 weeks, all participants repeated the BREQ-2 survey and wore the accelerometer again for 7 days. Results: The total number of participants was 19. At post-intervention, the treatment group had a significant decline in the frequency of prolonged SB > 60 min (p = .001) and a nonsignificant increase in the average length of moderate-to-vigorous PA bouts >10 min (p = .058). The treatment group had significant increases in two levels of autonomous motivation-identified (p < .001) and intrinsic (p = .003). The overall autonomous motivation score for the BREQ-2 significantly increased in the treatment group (p < .001). Practice Implications: The study revealed promise for vMI to positively impact PA among adolescents. However, for a novice in performing MI, a nurse-led MI session elicited change talk in participants toward individualized changes to improve health behaviors.