Increasing Physical Activity in Young Adults with an Intellectual Disability via a Classroom-wide Treatment Package

The World Health Organization estimates that only 25% of adults meet the current recommendations for weekly exercise. Adults with an intellectual disability are less likely to meet these standards than other people. In the present study, a classroom-wide treatment package that arranged individualized daily choice (between dancing and strength training), modeling (live, followed by video), and token reinforcement, was used to: (a) increase the number of steps taken and calories burned by six participants, two from each of three classrooms, and (b) increase the percentage of students in those classrooms who were consistently engaged in exercise during designated sessions. All six participants took more steps and burned more calories during both phases of the intervention (live and video model) than during baseline. The percentage of students who were consistently engaged in exercise also increased during both phases of the intervention, compared to baseline, across all three classrooms. Limited maintenance data indicated that the increased step counts and calories burned sustained when school staff implemented the video model intervention without researcher involvement. Because the procedure we used was relatively easy to implement and produced promising results, it appears to merit further investigation.