Move to Improve: a randomized workplace trial to increase physical activity

Abstract

Background: Workplaces are important settings for interventions to increase physical activity, but effects have been modest.

Purpose: To evaluate the efficacy of Move to Improve, a social-ecologic intervention delivered at the workplace to increase leisure-time physical activity.

Methods: A group-randomized 12-week intervention consisting of organizational action and personal and team goal-setting was implemented in Fall 2005, with a multi-racial/ethnic sample of 1442 employees at 16 worksites of The Home Depot, Inc. Change in physical activity was analyzed in Fall 2007 using latent growth modeling and latent transition analysis.

Results: Participants in the intervention had greater increases in moderate and vigorous physical activity and walking compared to participants in a health education control condition. The proportion of participants that met the Healthy People 2010 recommendation for regular participation in either moderate or vigorous physical activity remained near 25% at control sites during the study but increased to 51% at intervention sites. During the last 6 weeks of the study, intervention participants exceeded 300 weekly minutes of self-reported moderate-to-vigorous physical activity and 9000 daily pedometer steps.

Conclusions: The results support the feasibility and efficacy of the Move to Improve intervention and the role of goal-setting for attaining increased physical activity levels.