Guided goal setting: effectiveness in a dietary and physical activity intervention with low-income adolescents.

OBJECTIVE Determining the effectiveness of the guided goal setting strategy on changing adolescents' dietary and physical activity self-efficacy and behaviors. DESIGN Adolescents were individually assigned to treatment (intervention with guided goal setting) or control conditions (intervention without guided goal setting) with data collected before and after the education intervention. SETTING Urban middle school in a low-income community in Central California. PARTICIPANTS Ethnically diverse middle school students (n = 94, 55% male) who were participants of a USDA nutrition education program. INTERVENTION Driven by the Social Cognitive Theory, the intervention targeted dietary and physical activity behaviors of adolescents. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Dietary self-efficacy and behavior; physical activity self-efficacy and behavior; goal effort and spontaneous goal setting. ANALYSIS ANCOVA and path analysis were performed using the full sample and a sub-sample informed by Locke's recommendations (accounting for goal effort and spontaneous goal setting). RESULTS No significant differences were found between groups using the full sample. Using the sub-sample, greater gains in dietary behavior (p < .05), physical activity behavior (p < .05), and physical activity self-efficacy (p < .05) were made by treatment participants compared to control participants. Change in physical activity behaviors was mediated by self-efficacy. CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS Accounting for goal effort and spontaneous goal setting, this study provides some evidence that the use of guided goal setting with adolescents may be a viable strategy to promote dietary and physical activity behavior change.