Way to Be Active V (Framing vs. Forgiveness)

Summary

Employers are increasingly looking for opportunities to motivate sedentary employees to become more physically active. Workplace walking programs have had mixed success and typically show most improvement among participants that are already fairly active at a baseline. The goal of this study is to determine whether a financial incentive program can motivate sedentary employees to increase the number of steps they walk per day to meet a minimum threshold.

The primary outcome measure is the proportion of days a minimum activity of 7000 steps or more is achieved. Outcomes will be assessed each week for 3 months using incentives followed by 3 months of follow-up without incentives. Secondary outcomes will include the average steps walked per day.

Conditions

• Sedentary Lifestyle

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Feedback compared to 75th percentile

BEHAVIORAL

Forgiveness

BEHAVIORAL

Financial Incentive

For the first three months of the study, a weekly lottery will be held. Teams whose average daily step count for that week is ≥ 7000 will be eligible to collect their lottery winnings. Teams whose average daily step count is less than 7000 will receive messages about how much they would have won had the team met its goal.

BEHAVIORAL

Daily Feedback

Participants will be given daily feedback on whether or not they walked 7000 steps or more the day before.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• National Institute on Aging (NIA)

  collaborator NIH

• University of Pennsylvania

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Kevin M Volpp, MD, PhD · University of Pennsylvania

• Mitesh Patel, MD, MBA · University of Pennsylvania

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

OTHER

Masking

SINGLE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Max Age

100 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2014-01-31

Primary Completion

2014-10-31

Completion

2014-10-31

Countries

• United States

Study Locations