Psychocultural differences in physical activity-based antidepressant effects

Abstract

Recent research suggests that the antidepressant effects of physical activity on depression are indirectly mediated through activity-enhanced self-esteem and self-efficacy effects. Ethnically based psychocultural differences may then influence the therapeutic effectiveness of physical activity. However, no systematic theoretical evaluation of ethnic differences in activity-based antidepressant effects is available. Such an evaluation is necessary to optimize treatment effects for different cultural groups. In this study, structural regression analyses of self-report data compared the degree to which activity-based global self-esteem, physical self-esteem, exercise task efficacy, and exercise self-regulatory efficacy were associated with decreases in psychometric measures of depressive symptoms and depressive risk for a non-clinical sample of 147 young adult Hispanics (Mexican American Whites) and 153 Anglos (non-Hispanic Western European American Whites). Decreased symptoms were associated with increased global self-esteem and exercise regulatory-efficacy for both groups and with increased physical self-esteem for Hispanics. Unexpectedly, increases in depressive symptoms were associated with increased exercise task efficacy for Hispanics. These findings imply that Hispanics may anticipate greater symptom reduction than Anglos if exercise activities encourage global self-esteem, physical self-esteem, and exercise regulatory-efficacy attributions, but also discourage task-efficacy attributions. Decreased depressive risk was only associated with increased global self-esteem for either group.