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There is a growing need to identify acceptable and feasible opportunities to engage adults over 35 years in physical activity. Walking sports may be a potential means to engage adults in sport; however, there is limited evidence regarding appeal and feasibility to support its implementation and delivery. Using a two-step mixed-methods approach, we aimed (1) to quantitively identify significant predictors of intentions of adults over 35 years to participate in walking sports and (2) to understand why and how these identified predictors may be contextually relevant to the target group. In phase one, 282 adults over 35 years (Mage = 46.08, SD = 9.75) without prior experience of walking sports completed an online questionnaire assessing personal, psychosocial, program-related, and environmental predictors, and intentions to participate in walking sports. Hierarchical multiple linear regressions showed that perceived health status, attitudes, subjective norms, and distance of venue were significant predictors of intentions. In phase two, interviews with a subset of 17 participants indicated that, when implementing walking sport programs, program labeling, fear of the unknown, and individual differences in the appeal of walking sport warrant consideration. Together, these findings offer insight into the complex interplay of personal, psychosocial, program-related, and environmental predictors of adults' intentions to participate in walking sports. Addressing these elements of a walking sport program would make such programs more appealing to potential participants, and ultimately, more feasible and sustainable to conduct in the long run. © 2023 The Authors. Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science In Sports published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Issues Addressed: We aimed to identify latent health behaviour profiles of young adults and examine their associations with physical and mental health outcomes. We also characterised the profiles by socio-demographic characteristics. Methods: Data were collected between 2012 and 2014. Participants (N = 476) were young adults (M age [SD] = 22.1 [.57] years) from Generation 2 of the Raine Study longitudinal cohort. Health behaviours were measured via ActiGraph GT3X waist monitors (physical activity, sedentary behaviour) and questionnaires (diet quality, alcohol, smoking and sleep). Physical and mental health were measured using clinical health assessments, blood biomarkers, and questionnaires. Latent Profile Analysis using Mplus (8.2) was employed to identify profiles. Results: Four latent profiles were identified: ‘heavy drinkers with moderately unhealthy eating habits’ (high takeaway foods; n = 135), ‘unhealthy food abstainers’ (low takeaway foods; n = 138), ‘moderately sedentary alcohol abstainers’ (n = 139) and ‘physically active drinkers with unhealthy eating habits’ (high takeaway foods and sugary drinks; n = 64). ‘Physically active drinkers with unhealthy eating habits’ had the poorest (physical and mental) health outcomes, yet the lowest insulin resistance. ‘Unhealthy food abstainers’ had the most favourable health outcomes (adiposity, health perceptions, blood pressure). Sex differed among the profiles. Conclusions: The profiles identified among young adults are different to profiles with general adult populations. A novel finding was that ‘physically active drinkers with unhealthy eating habits’ had low insulin resistance. The findings also suggest that future interventions may need to be sex specific. So What: Our findings suggest that health behaviour interventions for young adults should be targeted to distinct profile characteristics.

Parents must rapidly adapt goals from various aspects of their lives to accommodate the demands of the early stages of parenthood. According to the self-concordance model, having autonomous goal motives (based on enjoyment or personal goal value) should foster effective self-regulation (e.g., coping strategies), better goal management, and increase the likelihood of goal attainment, compared to controlled motives (goals driven by demands/pressures). Metacognitive techniques, such as mental contrasting with implementation intentions (MCII), can also facilitate goal regulation. We used experience sampling over 1 month to study goal striving in parents (N = 103). We investigated how motives and spontaneously occurring features of MCII (i.e., mental imagery, reflection on obstacles, implementation intention planning) predict three key self-regulatory coping strategies: exerting effort, disengaging, and modifying/adjusting goals to make them attainable. We examined whether these strategies influenced relations between motives and goal progress, intergoal facilitation, and interference between parenting/competing life goals. Autonomous motives and MCII-like features were positively associated with effort coping, which in turn was related to goal progress and facilitation. Additionally, in individuals with high controlled motives, MCII-like features positively predicted increased adjustment of competing life goals. Goal adjustment positively predicted differences in intergoal facilitation. Results indicate that exerting effort and adjusting goals are effective strategies for attaining and managing multiple goals. Both goal motives and MCII-like features are associated with the use of these strategies. The findings suggest that parents will benefit from selecting autonomously motivated goals and using MCII-like features to manage parenting and other competing life goals © 2023, Motivation Science. All rights reserved, Funding: Australian Research Council (DP200101555)

Objective: We aimed to determine what older adults perceive to be need-supportive behaviours of peer walk leaders, drawing primarily from Self-Determination Theory (SDT). Design: Experienced peer leaders (n = 13; Mage = 73.23, SD = 6.55) and walkers (n = 17; Mage = 72.88, SD = 5.79) were recruited from existing walking groups. Individuals who expressed an interest in becoming a peer leader (n = 18; Mage = 72.72, SD = 4.99) or walker (n = 20; Mage = 78.90, SD = 10.45) were recruited from retirement villages. Main Outcome Measures: We conducted semi-structured interviews to identify leader behaviours that support autonomy, competence, and relatedness and analysed the data using framework analysis. Results: We identified eight main themes: eliciting walker interest, acknowledging and adapting to walkers’ requirements, ensuring walkers feel comfortable, cared for, and socially integrated, supporting walker confidence, and promoting success experiences. Inexperienced leaders differed from other sub-groups in what they perceived to be supportive behaviours. Conclusion: Future peer leaders could use the identified behaviours to help older adults feel motivated during group walks. New peer leaders can be educated about potential differences between what they describe as supportive and what walkers and experienced leaders perceive as need-supportive behaviours. © 2021 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group., Funding: The main funding body of this research is Curtin University of Technology, International Postgraduate PhD Scholarship awarded to M.K. This work was also supported by Western Australian Health Promotion Foundation (Healthway) (grant number 24258) to C.T.-N. and N.T.