Abstract
Background
Pregnant women without medical contraindications should accumulate 30 min of moderate exercise on most days of the week, yet many pregnant women do not exercise at recommended levels.
Purpose
The purpose the study was to examine barriers to leisure-time physical activity (LTPA) and investigate barrier and exercise self-efficacy as predictors of self-reported LTPA during pregnancy.
Methods
Pregnant women (n = 160) completed questionnaires eliciting barriers to LTPA, measures of exercise and barrier self-efficacy, and 6-week LTPA recall at gestational weeks 18, 24, 30, and 36.
Results
A total of 1,168 barriers were content-analyzed, yielding nine major themes including fatigue, time constraints, and physical limitations. Exercise self-efficacy predicted LTPA from gestational weeks 18 to 24 (β = 0.32, R 2 = 0.26) and weeks 30 to 36 (β = 0.41, R 2 = 0.37), while barrier self-efficacy predicted LTPA from weeks 24 to 30 (β = 0.40, R 2 = 0.32).
Conclusions
Pregnant women face numerous barriers to LTPA during pregnancy, the nature of which may change substantially over the course of pregnancy. Higher levels of self-efficacy to exercise and to overcome exercise barriers are associated with greater LTPA during pregnancy. Research and interventions to understand and promote LTPA during pregnancy should explore the dynamic nature of exercise barriers and foster women's confidence to overcome physical activity barriers.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Lokey E, Tran Z, Wells C, Myer B, Tran A. Effects of physical exercise on pregnancy outcomes: A meta-analytic review. Med Sci Sport Exerc. 2004; 23: 1244–1251.
Pivarnik J, Chambliss H, Clapp J, et al. Impact of physical activity during pregnancy and postpartum on chronic disease risk. Med Sci Sport Exerc. 2006; 38: 989–1006.
Hegaard HK, Pedersen BK, Nielsen BB, Damm P. Leisure-time physical activity during pregnancy and impact on gestational diabetes mellitus, pre-eclampsia, preterm delivery and birth weight: A review. Acta Obstet Gynecol Scand. 2007; 86: 1290–1296.
American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. Exercise during pregnancy and postpartum period, Committee Opinion no. 267. Int J Gynaecol Obstet. 2002; 77: 79–81.
Evenson KR, Savitz DA, Huston SL. Leisure-time physical activity among pregnant women in the US. Paediatr Perinat Epidemiol. 2004; 18: 400–407.
Symons Downs D, Hausenblas HA. Women's exercise beliefs and behaviors during their pregnancy and postpartum. J Midwifery Women's Health. 2004; 49: 138–144.
Ning Y, Williams MA, Dempsey JC, Sorensen TK, Frederick IO, Luthy DA. Correlates of recreational physical activity in early pregnancy. J Matern Fetal Neonatal Med. 2003; 13: 385–393.
Clarke P, Gross H. Women's behavior, beliefs and information sources about physical exercise in pregnancy. Midwifery. 2004; 20: 133–141.
Hinton P, Olson C. Predictors of pregnancy-associated change in physical activity in a rural white population. Matern Child Health J. 2001; 5: 7–14.
Mottola MF, Campbell M. Activity patterns during pregnancy. Can J Appl Physiol. 2003; 28: 642–653.
Zhang J, Savitz D. Exercise during pregnancy among US women. Ann Epidemiol. 1996; 6: 53–59.
Cramp AG, Bray SR. Pre and postnatal women's physical activity patterns: A multi-level longitudinal analysis. Res Q Exerc Sport. 2009 (in press)
Sallis JF, Owen N. Physical Activity and Behavioral Medicine. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage; 1999.
Sallis JF, Hovell MF. Determinants of exercise behavior. Exerc Sport Sci Rev. 1990; 18: 307–330.
Duncombe D, Wertheim E, Skouteris H, Paxton S, Kelly L. Factors related to exercise over the course of pregnancy including women's beliefs about the safety of exercise during pregnancy. Midwifery. 2007; doi:10.1016/j.midw.2007.03.002.
Clapp JF. The effects of maternal exercise on early pregnancy outcomes. Am J Obstet Gynecol. 1989; 161: 1453–1457.
Clapp JF, Dickstein S. Endurance exercise and pregnancy outcome. Med Sci Sports Exerc. 1984; 16: 556–562.
Brawley LR, Martin KA, Gyurcsik N. Problems in assessing perceived barriers in exercise: Confusing obstacles with attributions and excuses. In: Duda JL, ed. Advancements in Sport and Exercise Psychology Measurement. Morgantown, WV: Fitness Information Technology; 1998: 337–350.
Brawley LR, Culos-Reed SN, Angove J, Hoffman-Goetz L. Understanding the barriers to physical activity for individuals with cancer: Review and recommendations. J Psychosoc Oncol. 2002; 20: 1–22.
Hausenblas HA, Symons Downs D. Prospective examination of the theory of planned behavior applied to exercise behavior during women's first trimester of pregnancy. J Reprod Infant Psychol. 2004; 22: 199–210.
Symons Downs D, Hausenblas HA. Exercising for two: Examining pregnant women's second trimester exercise intention and behavior using the framework of the theory of planned behavior. Women Health Iss. 2003; 13: 222–228.
Symons Downs D, Hausenblas HA. Pregnant women's third trimester exercise behaviors, body mass index, and pregnancy outcomes. Psychol Health. 2007; 22: 545–559.
Ajzen I. The theory of planned behavior. Organ Behav Hum Dec. 1991; 50: 179–211.
Bandura A. Self-efficacy: The Exercise of Control. New York, NY: Freeman; 1997.
Bandura A. Health promotion by social cognitive means. Health Educ Behav. 2004; 31: 143–164.
Woodgate J, Brawley LR. Self-efficacy for exercise in cardiac rehabilitation. J Health Psychol. 2008; 13: 366–387.
McAuley E. Self-efficacy and the maintenance of exercise participation in older adults. J Behav Med. 1993; 16: 103–113.
Gyurcsik NC, Bray SR, Britton DR. Coping with barriers to vigorous physical activity during transition to university. Fam Commun Health. 2004; 27: 130–142.
McAuley E, Mihalko S. Measuring exercise-related self-efficacy. In: Duda J, ed. Advances in Sport and Exercise Psychology Measurement. Morgantown, WV: Fitness Information Technology; 1998: 371–381.
Haskell W, Lee I, Pate R, et al. Physical activity and public health. Updated recommendation for adults from the American College of Sports Medicine and the American Heart Association. Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2007; 39: 1423–1434.
Kriska A, Knowler W, LaPorte R, et al. Development of questionnaire to examine relationship of physical activity and diabetes in Pima Indians. Diabetes Care. 1990; 13: 401–411.
Kriska A, Casperson C. A collection of physical activity questionnaires. Med Sci Sport Exerc. 1997; 29: S79–S82.
Aaron D, Kriska A, Dearwater S, et al. The epidemiology of leisure physical activity in an adolescent population. Med Sci Sport Exerc. 1993; 25: 847–853.
Aaron D, Kriska A, Dearwater S, et al. Reproducibility and validity of an epidemiologic questionnaire to assess past year physical activity in adolescents. Am J Epidemiol. 1995; 142: 191–201.
Schulz L, Harper I, Smith C, Kriska A, Ravussin E. Energy intake and physical activity in Pima Indians: Comparison with energy expenditure measured by doubly-labeled water. Obes Res. 1994; 2: 541–548.
Bauer P. Validation of a Historical Physical Activity Tool: The Effects of Past Pregnancy Physical Activity on Current Physical Activity, Barriers to Physical Activity and Body Size. Dissertation Abstracts International, 66(09), 4734 (UMI No. AAT 3189609). Abstract retrieved May 28, 2008 from Digital Dissertations database; 2006.
Ainsworth B. The Compendium of Physical Activities Tracking Guide. Prevention Research Available at: http://prevention.sph.sc.edu/tools/docs/documents_compendium.pdf. Accessed verified August 6, 2008.
Weber RP. Basic Content Analysis. Newbury Park, CA: Sage ; 1990.
Green SB. How many subjects does it take to do a regression analysis? Multivariate Behav Res. 1991; 26: 499–510.
Landis RJ, Koch GG. The measurement of observer agreement for categorical data. Biometrics. 1977; 33: 159–174.
Tabachnick B, Fidell L. Using Multivariate Statistics. 5th ed. Boston, MA: Pearson Education; 2007.
Blanchard CM, Reid RD, Morrin RI, et al. Barrier self-efficacy and physical activity over a 12-month period in men and women who do and do not attend cardiac rehabilitation. Rehabil Psychol. 2007; 52: 65–73.
Bray SR. Self-efficacy for coping with barriers helps students stay physically active during their transition to first year at a university. Res Q Sport Exerc. 2007; 78: 61–70.
Courneya KS, McKenzie DC, Reid RD. Barriers to supervised exercise training in a randomized controlled trial of breast cancer patients receiving chemotherapy. Ann Behav Med. 2008; 35: 116–122.
Cohen J. Statistical Power Analysis for the Behavioral Sciences. 2nd ed. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum; 1988.
Baranowski T, Perry CL, Parcel GS. How individuals, environments, and health behavior Interact. In: Glanz K, Rimer BK, Lewis FM, eds. Health Behavior and Health Education: Theory, Research, and Practice. 3rd ed. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass; 2002: 165–184.
Lox C, Martin Ginis K, Petruzzello S. The Psychology of Exercise: Integrating Theory and Practice. 2nd ed. Scottsdale, AZ: Holcomb-Hathaway; 2006.
Warburton DE, Nicol CW, Bredin SS. Health benefits of physical activity: The evidence. Can Med Assoc J. 2006; 74: 801–809.
Acknowledgment
This research is funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
About this article
Cite this article
Cramp, A.G., Bray, S.R. A Prospective Examination of Exercise and Barrier Self-efficacy to Engage in Leisure-Time Physical Activity During Pregnancy. ann. behav. med. 37, 325–334 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12160-009-9102-y
Received:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12160-009-9102-y