In the research that I am conducting I believe that the more the person cares for one’s self the more they will take better care of their body. In this research they will discuss reasons for why people exercise is it based on health benefits or appearance benefits? What do you think? What is the main motive of why you are doing this study? Hopefully it is for you? Not to look better, (even though that is wonderful) but to feel better! If we look good on the outside but feel terrible on the inside. Soon that our body will show what it is feeling on the outside too! Just think about it? How many times do we put ourselves down not just the big things but the small little things? We tare are selves apart, thinking thoughts such as "if only"; "how do they do it?", "I wish I could be more like them", "If I had more of this or that I could do it", and last "I'm just not good enough". These and many more are considered self-defeating behavior statements to ourselves and we all do it! Me Too!

Research Article:

Effects of a Health-Based versus Appearance-Based Persuasive Message on Attitudes Towards Exercise: Testing the Moderating Role of Self-Monitoring. By: Rhodes, Ryan E., Courneya, Kerry S.

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of a health-based versus appearance-based persuasive message on exercise attitudes and intentions and to determine if these effects were moderated by the personality trait of self-monitoring. Post-hoc analysis found that low self-monitoring individuals responded with significantly stronger attitude scores from exposure to the health-based message than the appearance-based message. Further, the health-based message produced significantly higher attitude scores among low self-monitors than high self-monitors. These results suggest interventions utilizing exercise motives may require consideration of a participant's propensity to self-monitor.

The benefits of exercise have been well documented (American College of Sports Medicine, 1998; Biddle, 2000). Unfortunately, a majority of the adult population do not exercise regularly. Exercise adherence is a major challenge for health professionals regardless of demographic profile of the group or the purpose of the exercise (Robison & Rogers, 1994). Therefore, it is important to understand what factors influence regular exercise within sound theoretical frameworks in order to implement effective intervention strategies.

One such exercise intervention strategy is attitude change through persuasion (Rosen, 2000). Although persuasive messages have been used to change attitudes and intentions in the exercise domain, most such messages have been developed based on Protection Motivation Theory (Rogers & Prentice-Dunn, 1997). Consequently, the persuasive messages have been limited to health-based motives for exercise such as the prevention of cancer (Courneya & Hellsten, in press), cardiovascular disease (Fruin, Pratt, & Owen, 1991), and osteoporosis (Klohn & Rogers, 1991).

Although health is certainly an important motive for exercise behavior, it is clearly not the exclusive motive (e.g., Courneya & Hellsten, 1998). Physical appearance has also been shown to be a common motive for exercise participation (e.g., Courneya & Hellsten, 1998) and sometimes ranks second in importance to health (Davis, Fox, Brewer, & Ratusny, 1995). The multiplicity of motives for a behavior such as exercise makes the Theory of Planned Behavior (Ajzen, 1991) a more attractive framework for developing persuasive communications because it identifies a broader range of motivational beliefs than just health-based beliefs. This theory has repeatedly demonstrated its utility in predicting exercise behavior (Godin & Kok, 1996). The theory of planned behavior suggests that the immediate determinant of choice behavior is one's intention to engage in a behavior. Attitudes and subjective norms are suggested to exert their effects upon behavior through intentions, while the theory of planned behavior tries to also predict behaviors that are not completely volitional by incorporating perceptions of control as an additional predictor of intention and behavior.

The effectiveness of persuasive communications in the exercise domain may also be dependent on individual differences (Courneya, Bobick, & Schinke, 1999; Courneya & Hellsten, 1998). For example, Brouwers and Sorrentino (1993) manipulated protection motivation theory constructs for a fabricated medical condition and examined individual differences in the personality trait of uncertainty orientation (i.e., whether one is afraid of uncertainty or not). The results supported a moderating effect whereby uncertainty oriented individuals responded in the theoretically predicted directions whereas certainty-oriented individuals did not.

With respect to the effectiveness of health-based versus appearance-based persuasive messages in the exercise domain, the personality construct of self-monitoring may be the most theoretically relevant. Self-monitoring is defined as being attuned to one's self-presentation in social situations, and as regulating one's behavior to create a desired impression (Snyder, 1974; Snyder, 1987). High self-monitoring individuals, being sensitive to social cues, regulate their expressive self-presentation for the sake of desired public appearance. In contrast, the self-presentation of low self-monitoring individuals reflects their own feelings, attitudes and beliefs. Thus, high self-monitoring individuals place greater importance on public appearance and low self-monitoring individuals are more interested in maintaining desired inner states (Snyder, 1987).

At present, no research has compared the effectiveness of health-based versus appearance-based persuasive messages in changing exercise attitudes, or the potential moderating role of self-monitoring. Findings from other domains such as advertising (Snyder & DeBono, 1985, 1989) and voting (Lavine & Snyder, 1996) have suggested that high self-monitoring individuals are persuaded by appeals to image-oriented qualities more than low self-monitoring individuals. Moreover, these studies have indicated that low self-monitoring individuals are influenced by persuasive appeals to quality and value objectives more so than their high self-monitoring counterparts. These findings have been hypothesized to occur due to selective screening of relevant information based upon one's self-monitoring propensity (Lavine & Snyder, 1996).

Based on self-monitoring theory and research, we hypothesized that, in response to persuasive messages concerning physical appearance (e.g., improved muscle tone, weight control), high self-monitoring individuals would report more positive post-message attitudes and intentions compared to low self-monitoring individuals. Conversely, low self-monitoring individuals were expected to report more positive attitudes and intentions after exposure to a health-based message (e.g., cardiovascular functioning, stress relief) than high self-monitoring individuals.