American journal of preventive medicine
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Randomized Controlled Trial
The Faith, Activity, and Nutrition program: a randomized controlled trial in African-American churches.
Faith-based interventions hold promise for promoting health in ethnic minority populations. To date, however, few of these interventions have used a community-based participatory research (CBPR) approach, have targeted both physical activity and healthy eating, and have focused on structural changes in the church. ⋯ This faith-based structural intervention using a CBPR framework showed small but significant increases in self-reported leisure-time MVPA. This program has potential for broad-based dissemination and reach.
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Physical inactivity plays a role in the acquisition of heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and breast and colon cancer. The impact of such noncommunicable diseases on low- and middle-income countries is a major global health concern, but most studies in this area have focused on high-income countries. A better understanding of the factors that may influence physical activity in low- and middle-income countries is needed. ⋯ The prevalence of active commuting was low and varied by city. Personal factors were more consistently associated with bicycling than with walking, whereas perceived environmental features were not related to active commuting.
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The field of behavioral economics combines psychology and economics to investigate how individuals actually behave as opposed to how they would behave if they were being perfectly rational (as in the sense of maximizing their utility). Although initial applications focused on consumer behavior, such as explaining why people failed to save adequately for retirement, the field has moved increasingly into the area of explaining health behaviors as well as the design of lifestyle interventions, such as weight loss and smoking-cessation programs. This article provides an overview of several important behavioral economics concepts of relevance to public health and health behavior change.
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Child abuse is highly prevalent and associated with increased risk for a range of health problems, including cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, psychiatric disorders, and other health problems. Little is currently known about the mechanism by which early adversity confers risk for health problems later in life. ⋯ Although replication is required, this study suggests that epigenetic mechanisms may be associated with risk for health problems later in life in maltreated children. This study lays the groundwork for future studies examining health and methylation measures to further characterize the role of epigenetic mechanisms in conferring risk for medical problems in individuals with histories of early adversity.
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Prospective studies report associations between indicators of time spent sitting and obesity risk. Most studies use a single indicator of sedentary behavior and are unable to clearly identify whether sedentary behavior is a cause or a consequence of obesity. ⋯ Sitting time was not associated with obesity cross-sectionally or prospectively. Prior obesity was prospectively associated with time spent watching TV per week but not other types of sitting.