A Systematic Review Examining the Relationship Between Habit and Physical Activity Behavior in Longitudinal Studies

Abstract

Purpose: To explain physical activity behavior, social-cognitive theories were most commonly used in the past. Besides conscious processes, the approach of dual processes additionally incorporates non-conscious regulatory processes into physical activity behavior theories. Habits are one of various non-conscious variables that can influence behavior and thus play an important role in terms of behavior change. The aim of this review was to examine the relationship between habit strength and physical activity behavior in longitudinal studies.Methods: According to the PRISMA guidelines, a systematic search was conducted in three databases. Only peer-reviewed articles using a longitudinal study design were included. Both, habit and physical activity were measured at least once, and habit was related to physical activity behavior. Study quality was evaluated by assessment tools of the NHLBI.Results: Of 3.382 identified publications between 2016 and 2019, fifteen studies with different study designs were included. Most studies supported that positive correlations between habit and physical activity exist. Some positive direct and indirect effects of habit on physical activity were detected and only a minority of studies showed the influence of physical activity on habit strength. Studies differentiating between instigation and execution habit found positive correlations and revealed instigation habit as a stronger predictor of physical activity. The quality of studies was rated as reasonable using assessment tools of the NHLBI.Conclusion: This review revealed a bidirectional relationship between habit and physical activity. Whether habit predicts physical activity or vice versa is still unclear. The observation of habit influencing physical activity may be most appropriate in studies fostering physical activity maintenance while the influence of physical activity on habit may be reasonable in experimental studies with physical activity as intervention content to form a habit. Future investigations should differentiate between habit formation and physical activity maintenance studies depending on the research objective. Long-term study designs addressing the complexity of habitual behavior would be beneficial for establishing cue-behavior associations for the formation of habits. Furthermore, studies should differentiate between instigation and execution habit in order to investigate the influence of both variables on physical activity behavior independently.

Enjoyment as a Predictor of Exercise Habit, Intention to Continue Exercising, and Exercise Frequency: The Intensity Traits Discrepancy Moderation Role

“…As for habit, it has been defined as a learning sequence of acts that can result in automatic responses linked to specific cues, and has been associated with exercise behavior in health clubs (Kaushal and Rhodes, 2015;Weyland et al, 2020;Feil et al, 2021). In the PAAM model, for instance, it is suggested that the repetition of a behavior in the same context can shift the behavior gradually from explicit to implicit control processes (thus aiding habit formation), and that this shift can be supported by positive affective reactions to physical activity.…”

Investigating the relation between positive affective responses and exercise instigation habits in an affect-based intervention for exercise trainers: A longitudinal field study

“…One study concluded that building instigation rather than execution habits is related to changes in future exercise frequency (Phillips and Gardner, 2016). Positive correlations between habit strength and PA were also revealed in a current systematic review, which included longitudinal studies (Feil et al, 2021). Given the assumption that a behavior is automatically triggered by a cue, habit might contribute to exercise maintenance in that it bridges fluctuations in motivation and helps maintain the behavior even when rewards are removed (Neal et al, 2011;Rebar et al, 2019).…”

“…A strength of the study is that it examined adults in a realworld setting over a ten-week period with respect to the emergent variables of affect-based constructs and habit, which are promising for behavior change (Conner et al, 2020;Orbell and Verplanken, 2020). Only a few studies actually measured habit strength or automaticity at multiple time points (Feil et al, 2021).…”

Active Use and Engagement in an mHealth Initiative Among Young Men With Obesity: Mixed Methods Study

“…However, the moral underpinnings of offering a reward in return for health behaviors have been the subject of debate [25,26], and several studies have questioned whether HPFIs can produce sustained behavior change [27][28][29][30]. A recent paper has, however, characterized the relationship between physical activity behaviors and habits as bidirectional [31]. This means that once initiated by an HPFI [32,33], new behaviors such as activity tracking could reinforce physical activity habits and promote a virtuous cycle that persists even after the incentives have been discontinued.…”