TY - JOUR
T1 - Flourishing, affect, and relative autonomy in adult exercisers
T2 - A within-person basic psychological need fulfillment perspective
AU - Çetinkalp, Zişan Kazak
AU - Lochbaum, Marc
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2018 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
PY - 2018/6
Y1 - 2018/6
N2 - Flourishing is a construct used to understand human growth. Exercise psychology research is scant concerning this valuable construct. Hence, our purpose was to examine different levels of flourishing and related constructs within a large group of self-reported exercisers from a basic psychological need profile perspective. Participants were 389 female and 387 male adults attending fitness centers. Hierarchical cluster analyses revealed the presence of three clusters with significantly different psychological need profiles across the three basic needs. Separate multivariate analyses of variance were used for the analyses for our demographic variables and psychological variables. Follow-up post hoc tests showed that these clusters differed significantly and were low to moderate in meaningfulness regarding exercise min/week and sports experience. The clusters differed significantly, with moderate to large meaningfulness, in flourishing, positive affect, and relative autonomy. Self-reported exercise and sports participation were not the important cluster characteristics. Our results indicated that self-reported levels of flourishing, positive affect, and autonomy differ even within a large group of self-reported exercisers attending fitness centers that on average exceeded the weekly-recommended number of moderate-to-vigorous activity minutes. Thus, our results suggest the importance of fitness centers in meeting their participants’ three basic needs.
AB - Flourishing is a construct used to understand human growth. Exercise psychology research is scant concerning this valuable construct. Hence, our purpose was to examine different levels of flourishing and related constructs within a large group of self-reported exercisers from a basic psychological need profile perspective. Participants were 389 female and 387 male adults attending fitness centers. Hierarchical cluster analyses revealed the presence of three clusters with significantly different psychological need profiles across the three basic needs. Separate multivariate analyses of variance were used for the analyses for our demographic variables and psychological variables. Follow-up post hoc tests showed that these clusters differed significantly and were low to moderate in meaningfulness regarding exercise min/week and sports experience. The clusters differed significantly, with moderate to large meaningfulness, in flourishing, positive affect, and relative autonomy. Self-reported exercise and sports participation were not the important cluster characteristics. Our results indicated that self-reported levels of flourishing, positive affect, and autonomy differ even within a large group of self-reported exercisers attending fitness centers that on average exceeded the weekly-recommended number of moderate-to-vigorous activity minutes. Thus, our results suggest the importance of fitness centers in meeting their participants’ three basic needs.
KW - Cluster analysis
KW - Exercise adherence
KW - Exercise autonomy
KW - Human growth
KW - Motivation
KW - Self-Determination Theory
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85058851013&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.3390/sports6020048
DO - 10.3390/sports6020048
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85058851013
VL - 6
JO - Sports
JF - Sports
SN - 2075-4663
IS - 2
M1 - 48
ER -