Effects Of Childhood Stress And Mortality Threat On Exercise Commitment

According to data released by the World Health Organization,insufficient physical activity or lack of physical activity is the fourth leading cause of non-communicable disease-related deaths worldwide.Investigating the influencing factors of physical activity has important implications for promoting individual physical and mental health,as well as national vitality and development.Through reviewing and summarizing previous research,this article found that previous physical activity intervention studies based on the health promotion model had limited effectiveness,and previous research mainly focused on the current or short-term situation of individuals,while lacking exploration of life course-related factors.Therefore,this study will focus on two questions based on life history theory,using exercise commitment as an indicator of psychological commitment to physical activity:(1)whether there is an influence of childhood stress and current environment on individuals’ commitment to exercise and the underlying mechanisms;and(2)exploring protective factors that can buffer the negative effects of childhood stress on exercise commitment.Three studies(Pre-study,Study 1 and Study 2)were conducted to systematically explore the above issues.Prior to the formal study,the initiation effect of the death threat video material was examined through a pre-study to ensure that the research instrument was effective in evoking subjects’ feelings of instability and insecurity in the current environment,and finally to form the stimulus material for the subsequent experiment.The specific implementation and results of the formal studies were as follows:(1)Study 1 aimed to reveal the effects of childhood environment(childhood stress)and current environment(death threat initiation)on exercise commitment and the mediating role of perception of control.After randomly assigning the subjects to the experimental and control groups,the study used a death threat video to initiate the subjects’ feelings of insecurity and uncertainty about the environment,and then further measured their childhood stress,sense of control,and commitment to exercise,while counting the subjects’ subjective socioeconomic status,height and weight variables.The results revealed that childhood stress significantly and negatively predicted commitment to exercise,and sense of control mediated the effect between the two.The mediating effect of sense of control was significant only in the death threat initiation group,but not in the control group.(2)Study 2 aimed to investigate whether parent-child attachment influenced the mediating effect of childhood stress-sense of control-exercise commitment,and also to further explore the protective factors of childhood stress on exercise commitment.Study 2 used a questionnaire with 315 college students to complete the scales of childhood stress,sense of control,parent-child attachment,commitment to exercise,and subjective socioeconomic status.The results showed that childhood stress was a significant negative predictor of exercise commitment and that sense of control mediated the effect.The mediating effect of sense of control was significant only in the low parent-child attachment condition,but not in the high parent-child attachment condition.Based on the current situation of people’s physical inactivity in the information age,this study explored the relationship between childhood stress,current environmental stress,exercise commitment,and sense of control,respectively,by combining life history theory and the life history factor model of physical activity.In terms of theory,this study reveals a more evolutionary approach to physical activity from a life history perspective,and examines its internal mechanisms and boundary conditions,providing an evolutionary explanation for understanding the causes of physical inactivity and how to promote physical activity,in contrast to the previous cross-sectional or short-term perspective.In terms of practical implications,this study reveals that parent-child attachment can effectively buffer the adverse effects of childhood stress on individual development and adaptation from a developmental perspective.In addition,the present study found that childhood stress negatively predicted exercise commitment in both stressful and non-stressful environments,which may be related to contemporary environmental resource acquisition patterns that lead to conflicting life tasks of organismal health and survival and reproduction,suggesting the need to consider whether there is conflict with other life tasks when exploring physical activity influences in future studies.