The purposes of this study were to investigate differences in health risk perception, exercise knowledge, self-efficacy, exercise adherence, pros, cons, and physical activity by gender and the level of exercise participation and to identify the influences of the psychological constructs on physical activity in Korean university students.
A total of 495 university students (213 males, 282 females; age = 20.55 years,
It was confirmed that there were some partial differences in psychological factors and physical activity (total, intermediate/high intensity) depending on the gender and level of participation in sports of the students. Also there were differences in factors that affected their physical activities by gender and level of participation in sports.
It needs to be continued in order to gain more empirical knowledge from evidence-based investigations applying the theory-based interventions with some other variables such as gender, age and the level of physical activity participation.
University students are not easily aware of the need for healthy behaviors including physical activity, since they easily believe that their physical fitness and health are generally at their best [
What factors influence physical activity among university students? Generally, it is widely accepted that this enquiry has been explained on the basis of various exercise psychology theories such as health belief model, theory of planned behavior, self-efficacy theory, self-determination theory, and transtheoretical model in exercise psychology. The cognitive factors affecting exercise behavior in these theories are exercise knowledge [
Exploring the major factors involved in exercise and physical activity and revealing the relationship between them are important in understanding the phenomena of the study and in finding methods to lead to change. Based on these studies, programs for promoting physical activity have been presented and implemented to overcome the lack of exercise and physical activity. The early stages mainly provide information about physical activity to change awareness and cognitive information that informs the effects. They also show patterns such as providing decisions and actions while practicing physical [
The main strategies are similar when applied to adolescences [
So, what factors influence the physical activity of university students? It is necessary to identify which factors affect the physical activity of university students unless exercise knowledge or health risk perception are not the factors that control their activity. And based on the results, it would be necessary to change the existing method in which physical activity-related information is provided in the early stages. To confirm this, we propose that the need to refine the subject’s segmented characteristics to determine what factors influence their physical activities.
Although the psychological responses of the subjects vary depending on gender or level of exercise participation [
The purposes of this study were to investigate differences in health risk perception, exercise knowledge, self-efficacy, exercise adherence, pros, cons, and physical activity by gender and the level of exercise participation and to identify the influences of the psychological constructs on physical activity in Korean university students.
A total of 495 university students (213 males, 282 females; Mage = 20.55 years,
The Korean version of the International Physical Activity Questionnaires (IPAQ) developed by World Health Organization was used to measure the level of physical activity [
The exercise knowledge questionnaire developed Morrow and the colleagues [
The self and other risk judgments profile developed by Whalen and the colleagues [
This measure has three subscales with 25 negative healthrisk events individuals might experience in their lifetime (9 items for general health, 9 items for lifestyle, and 7 items for environment). The study participants were asked to indicate how they perceived their likelihood of encountering various health risks (i.e., cancer and smoking etc.) with 7-point response rates range from 1 (very unlikely) to 7 (very likely). The alpha reliabilities by domain were .90 for self-risk perception, .89 for other-risk perception, and .90 for significant other-risk perception (KMO=.86,
Exercise Self-efficacy Scale, developed by Bandura was revised for the Korean Version and applied in this study [
Pros and cons scale is a self-administered 10-items questionnaire, developed by Plotnikoff, Blanchard, Hotz, and Rhodes [
The exercise adherence questionnaire developed by Ajzen [
After the study participants were recruited, face-validity was checked through expert meetings on the contents and components of the questionnaire. A preliminary survey was also conducted on 15 participants to identify understanding of the questions and item goodness-of-fit. After explaining the purpose of the survey to the subjects, the questionnaire was conducted with the signature of the study agreement to participate voluntarily.
The data was analyzed with SPSS 23.0 and the descriptive statistics was performed to check the average, standard deviation, skewness, kurtosis and frequency of response of the questions for the questions. In addition, before analyzing the main research questions of the study, exploratory factor analysis and reliability analysis were performed to verify validity and reliability of the study instruments. Then, MANOVAs were conducted to identify differences in exercise knowledge, health risk perception, exercise self-efficacy, physical activity(PA) pros and cons, exercise adherence, and physical activity by gender and level of exercise participation. In addition, multiple regression analyses were carried out to identify the factors affecting physical activity by gender and exercise participation. All statistical analyses were performed using SPSS Win 23.0 (
<
Before performing the multiple regression analysis, the correlation analysis between physical activity and psychological variables was carried out. The variables that did not significantly correlate with physical activity were deleted in the multiple regression analysis. <
Furthermore, results showed that the psychological variables had significant influences on physical activity according to the level of physical activity participation, In specific, cons (β=-.25, p<.01) and others-health risk perception (β=.20, p<.05) were significant in explaining the total physical activity of the nonexerciser group. For the intermittent exercise group exercise adherence (β=.28, p<.001) and cons (β=-19, p<.01) were influential factors on the total physical activity. In the regular exercise group the total physical activity was significantly influenced by exercise adherence (β=.42, p<.001), and pros (β=.17, p<.05).
More than 80% of young people worldwide have been failed to involve the recommended physical activity, and even one in four adults is not participating in any types of physical activity [
The current study showed that physical activity or various cognitive and psychological factors differed depending on gender. Male students responded more to physical activity, exercise self-efficacy, physical activity pros, exercise adherence, and health risk perception than female counterparts, while females responded more to physical activity cons [
However, Jo and Song [
From these findings, college students may be less aware of the cognitive aspects such as exercise knowledge or health risk perception. However, for groups that do not participate exercise, the importance of information about the risks that may arise from not engaging in physical activity is given by the fact that health risk perception of others affects physical activity. However, it is revealed that health risk perception seems to be less influential to college students than middle-aged adults [
The physical activity intervention strategy has currently provided significant information on physical activity knowledge and benefits in the early stages, while making it possible to perceive physical activity pros and cons [
This research was supported by the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Korea and the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF-2016S1A5B5A02024293).
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Differences in physical activity and psychological variables by gender and the level of exercise participation
Variables | n | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 |
7(METs) |
||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
self | others | Significant other | moderate and strenuous | Total |
||||||||
Male | A | 48 | 2.77 (.68) | 3.96 (.71) | 2.61 (.56) | 3.47 (1.32) | 20.96 (3.28) | 4.39 (1.51) | 4.33 (1.53) | 4.60 (1.32) | 225.00 (573.43) | 1103.63 (1003.45) |
B | 78 | 2.97 (.62) | 3.89 (.75) | 2.46 (.77) | 4.52 (1.18) | 20.95 (3.14) | 4.35 (1.38) | 4.75 (1.03) | 4.71 (1.07) | 915.38 (1174.34) | 1953.19 (1387.87) | |
C | 87 | 3.36 (.60) | 4.21 (.51) | 2.26 (.67) | 4.88 (1.08) | 20.51 (2.81) | 4.72 (1.35) | 4.94 (.94) | 5.07 (.95) | 2951.45 (2506.67) | 3659.24 (2808.72) | |
Total | 213 | 3.08 (.66) | 4.04 (.67) | 2.40 (.69) | 4.40 (1.35) | 20.77 (3.04) | 4.51 (1.41) | 4.74 (1.15) | 4.84 (1.10) | 1604.25 (2120.78) | 2462.72 (2296.13) | |
Female | A | 97 | 2.57 (.55) | 3.84 (.69) | 2.88 (.49) | 3.34 (1.71) | 21.37 (2.82) | 4.22 (1.33) | 4.36 (1.26) | 4.52 (1.32) | 148.04 (410.44) | 1067.69 (1461.78) |
B | 125 | 2.74 (.52) | 4.01 (.48) | 2.60 (.58) | 4.32 (1.28) | 21.92 (2.43) | 4.29 (1.49) | 4.58 (1.14) | 4.63 (1.17) | 672.00 (947.28) | 1470.07 (1368.15) | |
C | 60 | 3.12 (.57) | 3.99 (.50) | 2.41 (.62) | 4.85 (1.21) | 21.33 (2.69) | 4.09 (1.51) | 4.33 (1.36) | 4.52 (1.41) | 1869.33 (2180.40) | 2742.18 (2452.21) | |
Total | 282 | 2.76 (.58) | 3.95 (.57) | 2.66 (.58) | 4.11 (1.52) | 21.61 (2.69) | 4.23 (1.44) | 4.46 (1.23) | 4.58 (1.27) | 750.14 (1363.24) | 1609.23 (1794.07) | |
gender | 16.77 |
1.75 | 10.19 |
.88 | 7.44 |
4.52 |
5.03 |
4.40 |
11.22 |
7.56 |
||
level of exercise (Scheffe) | 34.95 |
4.29 |
14.85 |
75.57 |
1.34 | 0.39 | 3.08 |
1.36 | 84.30 |
48.15 |
||
(a<b<c) | (a<c) | (a>b>c) | (a<b<c) | - | - | (a<b,c) | - | (a<b<c) | (a<b<c) | |||
gender×level of exercise | .03 | 3.57 |
.55 | .17 | .38 | 1.80 | 2.57 | 1.93 | 4.73 |
1.92 |
p<.001,
p<.01,
p<.05
A: nonexerciser; B: intermittent exerciser; C: regular exerciser; 1: self-efficacy; 2: pros; 3: cons; 4: exercise adherence; 5: exercise knowledge; 6: health risk perception, 7: physical activity
Sum of mild, moderate, and strenuous physical activity
Parenthesis is standard deviation.
Results of regression analysis between psychological variables and physical activity
group | Dependent variable | Independent variable | B | SD | β | VIF | adj |
||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Male | total PA |
4 | 783.88 | 101.72 | .47 | 7.71 | .00 | 1.00 | .22 | .22 | 59.39 |
Durbin-Watson | |||||||||||
1.81 | |||||||||||
Moderate & strenuous PA | 4 | 642.04 | 95.67 | .42 | 6.71 | .00 | 1.03 | .22 | .21 | 29.65 |
|
Durbin-Watson | |||||||||||
2 | 509.60 | 196.55 | .16 | 2.59 | .010 | 1.03 | 1.82 | ||||
Female | total PA |
4 | 274.74 | 69.66 | .23 | 3.94 | .00 | 1.15 | .16 | .15 | 17.16 |
3 | -482.05 | 183.31 | -.16 | -2.63 | .01 | 1.18 | Durbin-Watson | ||||
1 | 445.96 | 186.09 | .14 | 2.40 | .02 | 1.18 | 1.81 | ||||
Moderate & strenuous PA | 4 | 200.37 | 53.38 | .22 | 3.75 | .00 | 1.18 | .16 | .15 | 13.09 |
|
6-1 | -144.55 | 53.38 | -.15 | -2.72 | .01 | 1.04 | |||||
1 | 337.41 | 142.22 | .14 | 2.37 | .02 | 1.20 | Durbin-Watson | ||||
3 | -277.22 | 140.14 | -.12 | -1.98 | .05 | 1.19 | 1.98 | ||||
A | total PA |
3 | -615.29 | 201.35 | -.25 | -3.06 | .00 | 1.01 | .09 | .08 | 7.24 |
Durbin-Watson | |||||||||||
6-2 | 197.01 | 78.55 | .20 | 2.51 | .01 | 1.01 | 2.10 | ||||
Moderate & strenuous PA | 4 | 58.48 | 24.29 | .20 | 2.41 | .02 | 1.00 | .039 | .032 | 5.799 |
|
Durbin-Watson | |||||||||||
1.69 | |||||||||||
B | total PA |
4 | 313.55 | 74.56 | .28 | 4.22 | .00 | 1.02 | .13 | .12 | 14.44 |
Durbin-Watson | |||||||||||
3 | -392.51 | 141.19 | -.19 | -2.78 | .01 | 1.02 | 1.79 | ||||
Moderate & strenuous PA | 2 | 347.20 | 118.86 | .20 | 2.92 | .00 | 1.00 | .07 | .06 | 7.84 |
|
Durbin-Watson | |||||||||||
3 | -280.90 | 118.86 | -.18 | -2.59 | .01 | 1.00 | 1.85 | ||||
C | total PA |
4 | 935.13 | 165.49 | .42 | 5.65 | .00 | 1.03 | .23 | .22 | 21.15 |
Durbin-Watson | |||||||||||
2 | 863.00 | 387.22 | .17 | 2.23 | .03 | 1.03 | 2.03 | ||||
Moderate & strenuous PA | 4 | 731.24 | 151.18 | .37 | 4.84 | .00 | 1.03 | .21 | .19 | 18.55 |
|
Durbin-Watson | |||||||||||
2 | 1004.59 | 353.74 | .21 | 2.84 | .01 | 1.03 | 1.87 |
p<.001,
p<.01,
p<.05
A: nonexerciser; B: intermittent exerciser; C: regular exerciser; 1: self-efficacy; 2: pros; 3: cons; 4: exercise adherence; 5: exercise knowledge; 6: health risk perception(6-1 : Self, 6-2 : others); 7: physical activity
Sum of mild, moderate, and strenuous physical activity