Do Incentives Promote Action Planning in a Web-based Walking Intervention?

Area of Science:

• Behavioral Science
• Health Psychology
• Intervention Studies

Background:

• Inactive office-based employees often struggle with physical activity.
• Web-based interventions offer scalable solutions for promoting walking.
• Self-regulatory strategies like action planning are key to behavior change.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the impact of financial incentives on self-regulatory behavior (action planning) in a walking intervention.
• To assess the effectiveness of incentives in promoting engagement among inactive university employees.
• To determine if incentive-driven engagement in action planning influences daily step counts.

Main Methods:

• An 11-week Web-based walking intervention was employed.
• Participants were randomized into a control group (intervention only) or an incentive group (intervention plus weekly gift cards for action plan completion).
• Action plan completion and daily steps were measured before, during, and after the 4-week incentive period, with Cohen's d and RM-ANOVA used for analysis.

Main Results:

• A large effect size (d = 1.01) was observed for action plan completion in the incentive group, which remained high (d = 1.0) post-incentive.
• The incentive group showed greater daily steps during the post-incentive period (small effect size; d = 0.28).
• Incentives effectively promoted engagement in the self-regulatory strategy of action planning.

Conclusions:

• Financial incentives are effective in driving engagement with self-regulatory strategies like action planning.
• The positive effects on action planning persisted after incentive withdrawal.
• Further research is needed to optimize incentive structures and timing for sustained engagement.