Evaluating psychosocial and physical activity outcomes following an intervention among Filipino Americans

Abstract

Background: Physical activity (PA) is a strong contributor to enhancing a healthy lifestyle and preventing numerous chronic diseases. As ethnic minorities engage in low levels of PA, psychosocial and activity-based interventions for sustaining PA are crucial. Methods: The 6-month intervention incorporated culturally tailored educational workshops and weekly PA classes at a community center. Educational workshops were led by six trained community health workers (CHWs). Participants (n=37) completed pre- and post-intervention questionnaires regarding PA related self-efficacy, outcome expectations, social support, enjoyment, self-regulation, goal setting, and overall PA. Results: Following the intervention, study participants exhibited increases in weekly PA levels. Wilcoxon Signed-Rank test revealed higher median scores for Exercise Self-Efficacy Scale (ESES), Identified Regulation, and Intrinsic Motivation. Positive changes were observed for Physical Outcome Expectations, Social Outcome Expectations, Self-Evaluative Outcome Expectations, Physical Activity Enjoyment, Social Support for Exercise Scale – Family, Social Support for Exercise – Friends, and Exercise Goal-Setting. Conclusion: Community-based PA interventions may provide potential benefits to Filipino Americans, an ethnic Asian minority group, in identifying exercise benefits, developing proper exercise goals, increasing motivation, promoting PA behavior, and facilitating long-term PA adherence.

A Technology-Enhanced Physical Activity Intervention: A Feasibility Study

“…Also, significant increases in self-efficacy and moderate PA as well as improved cardiometabolic health with medium to large effects demonstrate that the intervention was successful and effective. Increased self-efficacy in our study is consistent with findings from previous PA intervention studies in various minority ethnic groups (Benitez et al, 2015; Bhimla et al, 2021). Prompt and automatic capture of the performance on PA level in addition to goal setting and self-monitoring via Fitbit probably empowered individual participants, which could have enhanced self-efficacy for PA.…”

“…Improvement in moderate PA in our study is in line with previous PA intervention studies (Bhimla et al, 2021; Joseph et al, 2021) and Fitbit incorporated PA interventions (Hardcastle et al, 2020; Hartman et al, 2018). Nonsignificant change in vigorous PA could be associated with the characteristics of our study sample (physically inactive and mostly women) that was difficult to engage as the first step of PA.…”

“…Social support from family and friends did not show a significant increase at week 12. Some prior studies observed a significant change after an intervention (Bhimla et al, 2021; Keller et al, 2014), whereas others did not (Benitez et al, 2015; Joseph et al, 2021). One explanation for this lack of significant pre-posttest changes in social support in our study would be that the participants’ engaging in PA and attending the intervention sessions were not in the most interest of their family or friends.…”

Family Involvement in Asian American Health Interventions: A Scoping Review and Conceptual Model

“…Of the 7175 articles screened, 181 received full-text assessments, resulting in a final study sample of 48 (Figure 1). Studies included data from randomized controlled trials, [25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38] quasi-experimental studies, [39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54][55][56] protocols or trial registries, [57][58][59][60][61][62][63] program evaluations, [64][65][66][67] and developmental or usability studies. [68][69][70][71][72] Studies spanned a 26-year time frame (1995-2021) and were conducted...…”

“…50 Moreover, family involvement also occurred voluntarily, particularly in the form of moral support or encouragement by, for example, joining participants in sessions or changing behaviors with them. 49,53 Even when voluntary, this involvement was at times crucial to an intervention's impact; Tuttle and Dewey described a breastfeeding promotion program for Hmong women in which direct communication with participants and health care staff was minimal unless a family member was present to assist in translation. 30 Intervention evaluation.…”