BEHAVIOUR CHANGE


IT’S A GOAL!


Setting goals with your members, based on an understanding of their underlying motivations, is a vital step in ensuring exercise adherence. Dr Paul Bedford reports


W


e all talk about setting goals with our members, but how many health club operators


sit down with each and every individual to ensure they have clear targets? This article will focus on


understanding the role that goals play in infl uencing day-to-day behaviour, motivation, values and beliefs – and how health clubs can use this information when it comes to coaching, supporting members and programme design.


Changing behaviours Sustaining exercise as a regular behaviour is not easy. Numerous theories and models of behaviour change exist, but the challenge I’ve always focused on is how to get individuals to maintain new lifestyle behaviours once started. As a gym instructor, I was always


encouraged by the numbers of new people starting to exercise in the club where I worked. Each day I would conduct inductions for those starting out on their new exercise behaviour, as well as spending time chatting to those who were my regulars – people who had already added going to the gym as an activity choice. Over time,


however, I realised that many of those who started so enthusiastically just weeks before were unable to maintain this new behaviour. They eventually disappeared from the club. Having studied exercise psychology,


I was aware that many of the new members I spoke to had goals they wished to achieve – but these were rarely the long-term motivators of behaviour. Many of their stated goals I now describe as general aims or outcome goals: things like lose weight, tone up, get fi t. These are very general and often require little consideration, because all of the rationalisation as to why they want to exercise has been done before the question is even asked. You could think of it like preparing an answer to a standard question – what’s your favourite colour, your favourite food, your favourite fi lm? – whereby the answer is stored and ready to be rolled out on request. Although being physically active on a


regular basis has obvious health benefi ts, it’s important to remember that not everyone who joins a gym is actually seeking health as an outcome for their efforts. Indeed, Eccles et al (2002) suggested that the goals individuals


THE HIERARCHY OF GOAL-SETTING


SUPERORDINATE GOAL


DESIRED STATE PRESENT STATE


FOCAL/OUTCOME GOAL


DAY TO DAY WORKOUT


SUBORDINATE/ PROCESS GOALS


Rebranding exercise: closing the gap between values and behaviour. M, Segar, J Eccles and C Richardson. International Journal of Behavioural Nutrition and Physical Activity 2011, 8:94


52 Read Health Club Management online at healthclubmanagement.co.uk/digital


General goals like ‘tone up’ are rarely the long-term motivators of behaviour


select for exercising are infl uenced and then endorsed by cultural values and social pressures, such as ‘lose weight’ and ‘tone up’ for women, and ‘build muscle’ for men – a stereotypical view I know, but this is his research, not mine. But whatever the external or internal


infl uences, people coming to the gym know they will be asked questions about their reasons for wanting to exercise, and so prepare an answer they feel is ‘correct’. Yes, they do want the outcome, but little thought goes into what needs to be done on a daily and weekly basis in order to get it, or what the underlying motivator or driver for that outcome might be.


Setting goals If we look at goal-setting theory, we discover that individuals are motivated to change because they want to reduce the perceived gap between their


August 2013 © Cybertrek 2013


© SHUTTERSTOCK.COM


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76  |  Page 77  |  Page 78  |  Page 79  |  Page 80  |  Page 81  |  Page 82  |  Page 83  |  Page 84  |  Page 85  |  Page 86