Characteristics of Successful Exercisers : Beliefs and Attitudes that Contribute to Success in Pursuit of Health and Fitness Goals

In the realm of personal training, it is well known that personal trainers play a role in enhancing exercise outcomes (Klain et al., 2014). However, there is a gap in knowledge in motivational drivers behind successful personal training experiences among university students at Canadian universities such as UBC. That is what motivated this project. Partnering with UBC Recreation, this project aims to understand the factors that lead to success in pursuit of health and fitness goals. Following the establishment of a research target and purpose, four constructs were selected to be further investigated: autonomy, competence, relatedness, and intrinsic motivation. These constructs were selected as they have previously been suggested as factors contributing to success when working with a personal trainer (Evensen, 2019). A questionnaire with 5-Point Likert Scale ranging from ‘Strongly Disagree’ to ‘Strongly Agree’ was utilized to collect data, which included 4-5 questions on each of the four tested concepts. A survey was distributed, via social media, posters, and personal connections. In total, we received 58 responses that met the inclusion criteria: members of the UBC community who work with a trainer or sport coach and consider themselves successful in pursuit of personal health and fitness goals. During data analysis, we found that our population of successful exercisers reported high levels of all four tested constructs: competence, autonomy, relatedness, and intrinsic motivation. This aligns with findings of Evensen (2019), who drew connections between these concepts and exercise success within general population personal training clients. While our findings generally align with the findings of Evensen (2019), there were some unique aspects. In particular, relatedness appears to be an extremely strong indicator of success. With a larger percentage of responses indicating High (48.8%) and Very High (34.1%) levels of relatedness than any other construct (see Appendix A1). This conclusively illustrates that our population of successful exercisers within the UBC community, also note that relatedness between themselves and their coaches and peers is of great importance to them; showing a strong correlation between relatedness and success with personal trainers or coaches. A second significant finding is that even successful exercisers are concerned about body image. Despite being generally intrinsically motivated, the extrinsic motivation of improving body image is prevalent among successful exercisers (see Appendix A2). This display of extrinsic motivation contrasts the generally intrinsic motivation displayed by participants throughout the rest of the survey (see Appendix A1). This illustrates the prevalence of body image as an extrinsic motivator, even within intrinsically motivated successful exercisers. Based on these findings we can report some recommendations to UBC recreation. Firstly personal trainers should make an active effort to engage in conversation clients, making the workout experience personalized and social, and build relatedness between client and trainer. To build relatedness between participants and peers, one could consider personal training sessions with two or three clients at once as well. Second, trainers can promote autonomy by allowing the client to have choice over their training regimen. Third, trainers should prioritize client comfort with equipment and form at first to promote competence. And finally, it is important that trainers use caution to avoid comments that promote extrinsic motivation regarding body image. Even complimenting someone’s body image puts an emphasis on body image as a priority. Instead, we recommend trainers focus on making workouts fun and enjoyable for the client. This promotes working for the enjoyment of the activity, rather than for an external goal like attaining a certain body image. Disclaimer: “UBC SEEDS provides students with the opportunity to share the findings of their studies, as well as their opinions, conclusions and recommendations with the UBC community. The reader should bear in mind that this is a student project/report and is not an official document of UBC. Furthermore readers should bear in mind that these reports may not reflect the current status of activities at UBC. We urge you to contact the research persons mentioned in a report or the SEEDS Coordinator about the current status of the subject matter of a project/report.”

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