Effect Motivation Has on Exercise Among Active College Students

Background/Purpose: Universities provide opportunities to be physically active through their student recreation centers. The cost to use these centers is a part of full-time tuition. Many students do not take advantage of these facilities and researchers have found that one of the steepest declines in physical activity participation occurs during young adulthood. Colleges and universities play potentially crucial roles in developing interventions to help young adults adopt active healthy lifestyles that become lifetime habits. While researchers have examined motivations towards exercise using psychological theories, few researchers have examined motivation from a philosophical perspective. The purpose of this study is to describe through a philosophic lens, objective and subjective motivation to exercise of college students who exercise.

Method: Participants were students (male n=50) and (female n=50) active in a university student recreation center. Participants were randomly chosen from those swiping their university student credentials at the center. All participants completed the Rickel Value Inventory (Cronbach Alpha .78-.89), a valid and reliable tool for measuring objective (eg. body appearance, social) and subjective (moving for movement sake) values towards exercise from a philosophic perspective. The Likert scale inventory has respondents answer 11 objective and 7 subjective statements about motivations towards exercise. Two open-ended questions asked their personal perspectives about physical activity.

Analysis/Results: Data was analyzed using independent t-tests in SPSS 18.0. Alpha was set at p<.05. A significant difference was found by gender on extrinsic motivators to exercise t(98) = -2.90, p=.004. Women (M=40.04 + 4.01) had significantly higher extrinsic motivations towards physical activity compared to men (M=37.68 + 4.01). A significant difference was found by gender on intrinsic motivators towards exercise t(98) = 2.14, p=.03.  Men (M=24.10 + 4.48) were more intrinsically motivated towards exercise compared to women (M=22.34 + 3.70).

Conclusions: Women scored moderately high in extrinsic motivation while men scored significantly lower, yet also moderately high. Women scored significantly lower in intrinsic motivation compared men. Written responses by women reflected their inventory responses towards losing weight and appearance while men emphasized the importance of competition, overcoming weaknesses, and sports participation. Both stated being physically active was important for health reasons. Enjoyment of the activity for movement sake was greater in men compared to women. Understanding the objective and subjective philosophic motivations in healthy, active college-aged men and women may help provide a broader view about drives towards physically active lifestyles and thus provide another potential manner to bring people to physical activity