Associations of an Online Health Coaching Intervention with Movement Behaviors and Perceived Health: A Mediation Analysis.

The purpose of this study was to examine the associations of an online coaching intervention that included goal setting with movement behaviors and perceived general health (GH) and emotional wellbeing (EW) in college students. Participants were college students from a university within the western United States (N=257; 57.2% female). Participants met with health coaches in an online setting for one hour and goals were set for physical activity (PA) and/or sleep duration. PA, sleep duration, and perceptions of GH and EW were collected at baseline and at 2- and 4-weeks after the coaching session within a single arm research design. Mediation analyses determined the indirect effect (IE) of each movement behavior both after the health coaching session and after goal setting on the GH and EW outcomes in addition to the bidirectional association between GH and EW. No movement behavior positively mediated the associations with GH or EW after the health coaching session or after goal setting, although after goal setting PA and weeknight sleep at 2-weeks associated with GH at 4-weeks (β=0.16-0.39, p<0.01) and associated with EW at 4-weeks (β=0.22-0.25, p<0.01). EW mediated the associations of the health coaching session on GH (IE=0.19, p<0.001) and GH mediated the association of the health coaching session on emotional wellbeing (IE=0.09, p<0.001). In conclusion, movement behaviors correlated with GH and EW, but no positive mediating associations were observed. After the health coaching session, EW mediated the association with GH and vice-versa, suggesting a bidirectional association between the two health perceptions.