The Health Science Technology Academy is offering an opportunity to a limited number of schools (n=5) to participate in and run a 4-week pedometer based research project. The project will be an opportunity for HSTA clubs to increase the physical activity of students in their schools through use of pedometers. HSTA clubs will recruit 30-40 interested students to participate in a walking club; each participant will receive a pedometer. Week one will involve surveying the interested students and collecting a baseline step count. For the remainder of the project, students will be split into two groups, intervention and control. The control group will continue to monitor their weekly step count. The intervention group will monitor step count, but will also be given written material that provides ideas on how to increase the number of steps they take and how steps relate to caloric expenditure. At the end of the four weeks, a comparison will be made between the groups on average steps per day. Before and after the intervention, all participants will complete a short questionnaire battery to track changes on motivational constructs.

Full Project Description (RTF file)