In your professional careers, you will undoubtedly face many problems related to the broad topic of Exercise Psychology. Many of you will likely be treating individuals who are afflicted with one or more chronic diseases such as cardiovascular disease, cancer, obesity, Type II diabetes, and chronic obstructive respiratory disease (COPD), and secondary symptoms of these diseases/disorders are most often of a psychological or physiological nature. All of us, regardless of professional pursuits, will have to address the very complex issues of “adherence” and behavior change. With these truisms in mind, the purpose of this assignment is twofold. First, is for you to develop skills that will allow you to address future professional or personal circumstances without relying exclusively on past experience and intuition, or without relying too heavily on authority for information or solutions a problem.
This first aim dovetails with a primary objective of this class – addressed in part through this exercise – which is for you to become familiar with accessing, and taking advantage of, the scientific literature. The second aim of this project is for you to carefully read several research studies and write about a topic of personal interest to you. Briefly, this project involves the development of a paper (approximately 4 single-spaced, typed pages) with the following structure:
(1) identifying and describing a question or real-life problem of personal interest that is related to exercise psychology or identifying a topic from class that you are personally interested in and that (hopefully) can be applied to your own professional interests. You can choose to study (a) the consequences of exercise/physical activity for a selected population, (b) the barriers toward or beliefs about physical activity among a selected population, or (c) adherence and behavior change issues towards physical activity in a select patient population.
Here are a few examples:
a) What is the impact of resistance exercise on stereotypical behaviors in autism spectrum disorder?
b) How does exercise compare to traditional antidepressants for reducing depressive symptoms among patients with clinical depression?
c) What is the optimal physical activity prescription for breast cancer survivors?
d) How might physical activity bolster the immune system in patients with rheumatoid arthritis?
e) What are some effective strategies to increase the initiation/adoption of exercise among middle-aged adults with obesity?
f) What are the barriers to exercise among college-aged adults with anxiety?
(2) using information technology to locate, review, and critique at least 6 relevant research-based articles and/or literature reviews from scientific journals or textbooks. Only one of the articles can be a literature review – the others need to be original research articles . So, part of your grade will be assuring that at least 5 of your references were original research articles. You are more than welcome to use more than 6 articles for your final project.
(3) critically reviewing and evaluating this information to allow you to present the problem or idea along with an evidence-supported solution or answer to your question. This will include either, for instance,(a) evidence supporting the role of exercise, physical activity, or sedentary behavior in relation to the condition of interest or a particular health outcome; (b) barriers to the promotion of exercise/physical activity among individuals suffering with the condition or disease; and/or(c) a proposed solution or a justified course of action to increase exercise/physical activity in a curtain patient population. You do not have to have all of these components in your final paper, only those that are most pertinent to answering your primary question.
