Examining the role of attention focus walking training on conscious motor processing during rehabilitation by older adults at risk of falling: A randomized controlled trial.

This study examined the impact of walking training with different attention focus instructions on real-time conscious motor processing and fall-related rehabilitation outcomes in older adults at risk of falling. A total of 102 community-dwelling older adults (mean age = 75.2 years, SD = 6.8 years) were randomly assigned to three groups: no attention focus walking group (NAFWG), external attention focus walking group (EAFWG), or internal attention focus walking group (IAFWG). All groups underwent 12 training sessions. Assessments were conducted at baseline, post-training, and six months later, measuring real-time conscious motor processing, functional balance and gait, balance ability, functional mobility, walking ability, trait conscious motor processing propensity, fear of falling, and recurrent falls. The EAFWG showed significant reduction on real-time conscious motor processing immediately after training (p = 0.015). No changes were observed for the IAFWG and NAFWG. All groups showed significant improvements in functional balance and gait (p < 0.001) and balance ability (p < 0.001) post-training. Implementing external focus instructions during walking training could be a feasible and beneficial strategy for reducing real-time conscious motor processing, which may improve walking performance and prevent falls in older adults. Further research is needed to examine the sustained benefits of these interventions and determine optimal training dosage for older adults with different risks of falling in fall prevention.

Health-promotion interventions targeting multiple behaviors: A meta-analytic review of general and behavior-specific processes of change.

Although health-promotion interventions that recommend changes across multiple behavioral domains are a newer alternative to single-behavior interventions, their general efficacy and their mechanisms of change have not been fully ascertained. This comprehensive meta-analysis (6,878 effect sizes from 803 independent samples from 364 research reports, N = 186,729 participants) examined the association between the number of behavioral recommendations in multiple-behavior interventions and behavioral and clinical change across eight domains (i.e., diet, smoking, exercise, HIV [Human Immunodeficiency Virus] prevention, HIV testing, HIV treatment, alcohol use, and substance use). Results showed a positive, linear effect of the number of behavioral recommendations associated with behavioral and clinical change across all domains, although approximately 87% of the samples included between 0 and 4 behavioral recommendations. This linear relation was mediated by improvements in the psychological well-being of intervention recipients and, in several domains (i.e., HIV, alcohol use, and drug use), suggested behavioral cuing. However, changes in information, motivation, and behavioral skills did not mediate the impact of the number of recommendations on behavioral and clinical change. The implications of these findings for theory and future intervention design are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Priming behavior: A meta-analysis of the effects of behavioral and nonbehavioral primes on overt behavioral outcomes.

Past meta-analyses of the effects of priming on overt behavior have not examined whether the effects and processes of priming behavioral or nonbehavioral concepts (e.g., priming action through the word go and priming religion through the word church) differ, even though these possibilities are important to our understanding of concept accessibility and behavior. Hence, we meta-analyzed 351 studies (224 reports and 862 effect sizes) involving incidental presentation of behavioral or nonbehavioral primes, a neutral control group, and at least one behavioral outcome. Our random-effects analyses, which used the correlated and hierarchical effects model with robust variance estimation (Pustejovsky & Tipton, 2021; Tanner-Smith et al., 2016), revealed a moderate priming effect (d = 0.37) that remained stable across behavioral and nonbehavioral primes and across different methodological procedures and adjustments for possible inclusion/publication biases (e.g., sensitivity analyses from Mathur & VanderWeele, 2020; sensitivity analyses from Vevea & Woods, 2005). Although the findings suggest that associative processes explain both the effects of behavioral and nonbehavioral primes, lowering the value of a behavior weakened the effect only when the primes were behavioral. These findings support the possibility that even though both types of primes activate associations that promote behavior, behavioral (vs. nonbehavioral) primes may provide a greater opportunity for goals to control the effect of the primes. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

The impact of multiple-behavior HIV interventions as a function of regional disadvantages: An analysis of syndemics.

OBJECTIVE: Disadvantaged populations, including inhabitants of developing countries as well as racial/ethnic and sexual minorities in the United States, are disproportionally burdened by human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection, delayed HIV diagnosis, and unfavorable HIV-treatment outcomes. HIV interventions targeting single behaviors (e.g., testing) in these populations have shown to be efficacious at producing behavioral and clinical change but have been unable to eliminate the social health disparities associated with syndemics (i.e., a set of connected risks, interacting synergistically, and contributing to excess burden of disease in a population). METHOD: This meta-analysis of 331 reports (clusters; number of effect sizes [k] = 1,364) assessed whether multiple-behavior interventions that target clusters of syndemic risks are more efficacious for those in disadvantaged regions and social groups. RESULTS: Across the board, multiple-behavior interventions were more efficacious than single-behavior ones as well as passive control groups among samples from countries with lower log gross domestic product (GDP), lower Human Development Index (HDI), and lower Healthcare Access and Quality (HAQ) Index. CONCLUSIONS: Within the United States, the efficacy of multiple-behavior interventions was similar across different levels of representation of racial/ethnic and sexual minorities. The analyses used robust variance estimation with small-sample corrections to assess the differential effects of multiple-behavior interventions and Egger Sandwich test with the multilevel meta-analysis approach to detect selection biases. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).