Exercise motives impact on physical activities measured using wearable devices.

While many think that individuals can use exercise alone to lose weight, exercise only accounts for roughly 25% of weight loss. However, physical activity has many other benefits including to combatting health conditions and improving sleep, mood, and energy levels. With all of the health benefits, we feel one must understand which motives interest individuals to exercise. The purpose of this study is to determine which exercise motives influence participant's physical activities using objective measures as collected by a wearable device. To do so, we recruited 96 college Freshmen to participate in this 90-day study. Participants completed the Exercise Motives Inventory-2 (EMI-2) and received a Fitbit during a pre-study orientation where we also collected their weight, height, and blood pressure. A Fitbit was issued so that we could track their activity using an unbiased measurement. Motivators for this age group included Interpersonal Motives, Health Motives, and Fitness Motives, and participants' physical activities. These individuals were not influenced by Body-Related or Psychological Motives.