Applying a Stress Framework to Health Behavior Change: A Fitbit Study

The current study aims to counteract perceived stress-related barriers to implementation and maintenance of positive health behavior change (i.e., increasing physical activity), by providing an individually tailored and comprehensive informational support program. This translates into an intervention that, in addition to behavior monitoring (low informational support), will provide comprehensive informational support by combining advice and suggestions on how to achieve positive physical activity change with information on the health effects of such a change (high informational support). The latter will be achieved by providing information on general health benefits of increasing physical activity as well as on how physical activity change is linked to individual changes in health-relevant outcomes (i.e., mood and sleep quality changes). Specifically, it is hypothesized that: * Higher chronic stress levels in general as well as stress perceived by the anticipated task of improving physical activity will be negatively associated with physical activity changes. * Participants receiving informational support will show decreases in task-related stress. * Furthermore, participants who receive comprehensive informational support will show larger physical activity improvements than participants who do not receive informational support. * Initial stress will act as a moderator of the effects of informational support on physical activity, such that higher initial stress will reduce the positive effects of informational support. Importantly, the proposed intervention is specifically designed to support the subsequent development of an intervention program that is not only feasible, but easy to implement by individuals motivated to achieve a positive health behavior change. A key factor will be the insights gained into stress as a mechanism that counteracts implementation and maintenance of behavior change. This is especially important given the central role of stress in neg