Exploring African American Females' Physical Activity Through Social Identity Theory

Background/Purpose: African American females are at a disproportionate risk for high levels of physical inactivity. This is true for college students, and there is a dearth of information about this critical period. To facilitate efforts to encourage the adoption of physically active lifestyles, it is important to understand why African American college-aged females consistently report low levels of physical activity. Social identity theory (Tajfel, 1982; Turner, 1982) provides a framework to explore how constructs such as race and gender influence decisions about physical activity.  Guided by this theory, the purpose was of this study was to investigate how African American female college students’ perceptions of racial identity, gender-role identity, exercise identity and social support relate to physical activity participation.

Method: Participants were 294 female African American college students recruited from a variety of institutions across the US.  They completed an online survey using previously validated questionnaires to assess racial identity (CRIS; Cross & Vandiver, 2001), gender-role identity (BSRI, Bem, 1974) exercise identity (EIS ; Anderson & Cychosz, 1994), self-reported physical activity (LTEQ, Godin & Shephard, 1985), and family and friend social support (SSES, Sallis et al. 1987).

Analysis/Results: Simple correlations revealed that race and gender identities were generally not related, and those identities were not related to social support. There was a small positive correlation between an internalized multi-culturalist-inclusive racial identity and femininity (r=.34). Exercise identity and frequency of physical activity were moderately related (r=.53).  Regression analyses revealed an internalized multi-culturalist inclusive racial identity ( β = .192, p < .006) and masculinity(β = .187, p < .008) were significant positive predictors of exercise identity, accounting for 9.0% of the variance.   Race and gender identities did not predict physical activity behavior.  With regard to social support, friend support was a significant predictor of both exercise identity (β = .368, p < .01, R² = .146) and physical activity frequency (β = .287, p < .01, R² = .107), but family support did not enter either model. 

Conclusions: Although an inclusive racial identity was associated with femininity and exercise identity, neither race nor gender identities were associated with physical activity.  Participants who reported higher levels of social support from friends had stronger exercise identities and reported higher levels of physical activity. Based on these findings, it is suggested that developing a supportive social network for African American college women is one strategy that could be effective in increasing physical activity.