Physical Activity Essay

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DISCUSSION
This study investigated the barriers and enablers of physical activity in various workplaces. Thematic analysis that ensued provided relevant clues into understanding workers’ plight in the workplace with regard to actively participate into physical activity. Sedentary behavior settled in with time, given the amount of hours workers spent at work daily. It was equally important to bring into light factors that influenced workers behaviors so they could inform recommendations about physical activity for workers’ moral, motivation, and keeping healthy.
Although participants displayed a great deal of understanding about the need to get active in the workplace, there was an overwhelming inability to translate such an understanding into meaningful actions. More often, time and the desire to accomplish the ‘business as usual’ was at odds and left no room for physical activity. It could also be construed from these observations that time was an important factor workers were unable to control. And when they could control it, a powerful sense of self-efficacy could be revealed from the workers’ desire and enthusiasm to get involved into physical activities. Another factor we felt important to highlight and which was consistent with theoretical research work about motivation included the impact of normative norms in people’s intention to perform a behavior of interest. Participants in the study were keen to rely on a formidable support from closer circle such as family relatives, but also coworkers. The contrast we observed, however, with the norm was that coworkers who could have acted as support and motivators for the behavior also found themselves struggling with the same characteristics as participants. This suggested the nee...

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...ishing achievable and measurable goals and planning well ahead made working out pleasurable and successful. It also demonstrated strong self-efficacy and often provided an indicator of future excellent health in the workplace.
We believed there is still more to learn about the impact of the built-environment on people creativity, productivity and on involvement into physical activities. Regardless of the occupations, new research must look into how groups of related professions could benefit from a suitable and adapted workspace that could enhance their well-being and reduce the level of stress associated with spending considerable time at work. Other research lead could investigate further the use of flextime for workers, which is been known to allow people to work from home. However, it is not always possible given the variance of work settings and professions.

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