Association of American Indian cultural identity with physical activity.

OBJECTIVE: Cultural factors are associated with health behaviors among American Indians. Accordingly, the objective of our study was to investigate whether cultural identity, defined as the primary language spoken at home, is associated with: 1) higher total physical activity levels, and 2) levels of leisure-time physical activity recommended for health benefits in a diverse sample of American Indians. DESIGN: Cross-sectional analysis of 5,207 American Indian adults 18 to 82 years. Participants resided on the Oglala Sioux (n=2,025) and Cheyenne River Sioux (n=1,528) reservations in South Dakota, and the Gila River Indian Community (n=1,654) in Arizona. RESULTS: Bicultural participants in South Dakota, but not Arizona, reported significantly higher total physical activity compared to the English-only group (P<.05). About 35% of English only speakers, 39% of American Indian/Alaska Native only speakers, and 39% of participants speaking both languages met the 150 minutes/week activity threshold. Odds of being sufficiently active were higher among bicultural respondents in both regions when compared to respondents endorsing only English, controlling for sociodemographic and health-related covariates (P<.05). CONCLUSION: Bicultural respondents among tribal members in South Dakota had significantly higher total physical activity, and higher levels of sufficient leisure-time activity in both South Dakota and Arizona, compared to those who spoke either language exclusively. Interventions that encourage American Indians to develop their bicultural efficacy and to draw on resources for healthy living that may be available in all the cultures with which they identify are recommended.

A bird in hand: discouraging gambling on a slot machine simulation.

Using a slot machine simulation, our laboratory has found that participants, given the opportunity not to gamble and to keep the money they have been staked, almost always choose to play the simulation. In this study, the authors investigated whether increasing the salience of the money for which participants played or increasing the response effort required to gamble the money would decrease gambling. In Experiment 1, participants in different groups were told about, were shown, or held the dollars 10 they were to be staked to play the simulation. Results showed that participants who held the money prior to gambling played fewer trials and bet less money than participants in other groups. In Experiment 2, participants in different groups were staked with dollars 5 in nickels, quarters, or their choice of nickels or quarters. Results showed that the participants staked with nickels ultimately gambled a similar amount of money as did participants staked with quarters. They did so by playing the simulation more times than the other participants. Participants staked with nickels did, however, end the session with the most money. Findings suggest ways that gambling and gambling losses can be lessened.

The gambling behavior of American Indian and non-Indian participants: effects of the actions and ethnicity of a confederate.

The present experiment investigated whether the gambling of American Indian (AI) and non-AI participants would be sensitive to the actions and/or ethnicity of another gambler (i.e., a confederate) when playing a slot-machine simulation. Eight male AIs and eight male non-AIs participated in five gambling sessions. In one, the participant gambled alone. In the other four, the participant played in the presence of a confederate of the same or different ethnicity who gambled the entire session or quit after playing five times. The gambling of the AI and non-AI participants did not differ, nor was either group sensitive to whether the confederate was AI or non-AI. Gambling behavior was altered by the confederate's actions, with participants gambling less when the confederate left the session than when alone or when the confederate stayed and gambled. These results suggest that the differences in gambling problems between AIs and non-AIs reported in the overall literature may not be a function of ethnicity per se. They also suggest that the actions of other gamblers may inhibit gambling, which may have treatment implications.