Comprehensive Research Project on How to Create an Exercise Habit
24 Hour Fitness® is partnering with the University of Pennsylvania Behavior Change for Good Initiative [BCFG] to support research into what works best for creating lasting exercise habits. With an interdisciplinary team of world-renowned researchers, the BCFG addresses the broader question of how to make positive behavior change stick in aspects of life related to health, education and savings. Angela Duckworth, PhD, and Katherine Milkman, PhD, are co-directors of the StepUp Program, a 28-day online program that tests rewards, financial incentives, customized texts, social influence and other content to evaluate what works best to improve people’s daily gym-going habits.
“Duckworth and Milkman and their cohorts . . . want to figure out how to create sustained behavior change—not changing a single decision or a couple of weeks’ worth of decisions, but a lifetime of decisions,” said Lashaun Dale, vice president of content and programming for 24 Hour Fitness. According to Duckworth, “The final frontier [of progress] is human nature itself. If we cannot do what’s in our best interest repeatedly over time—eat the right things, go to sleep at the right time, spend the time with our friends and family instead of surfing YouTube videos—we’ll never find enduring meaning and happiness.”
To learn more or to register for the exercise study, go to 24go.co/stepup.
Shirley Eichenberger-Archer, JD, MA
Shirley Archer, JD, MA, is an internationally acknowledged integrative health and mindfulness specialist, best-selling author of 16 fitness and wellness books translated into multiple languages and sold worldwide, award-winning health journalist, contributing editor to Fitness Journal, media spokesperson, and IDEA's 2008 Fitness Instructor of the Year. She's a 25-year industry veteran and former health and fitness educator at the Stanford Prevention Research Center, who has served on multiple industry committees and co-authored trade books and manuals for ACE, ACSM and YMCA of the USA. She has appeared on TV worldwide and was a featured trainer on America's Next Top Model.
