Understanding Psychosocial Mechanisms of the Influences of Acculturation on Physical Activity Participation among Ethnic Minorities in the United States

Abstract

Culture has been studied as a factor that may account for physical activity disparities among different ethnicities in the U.S. Accordingly, acculturation has been one of the most prominent topics studied to explain mechanisms by which an individual or group may adopt a healthy or unhealthy lifestyle. Nevertheless, many studies lack the use of comprehensive theoretical frameworks, hence they are less informative for intervention design and implementation. This study was purposed to: 1) review important concepts of acculturation, and empirical findings regarding its association with physical activity participation, and 2) propose plausible syntheses of psychosocial theories of physical activity behavior and acculturative variables. The pros and cons of unidirectional and bidirectional models of acculturation were compared in terms of their theoretical plausibility as well as practicality. Acculturation has generally been found to be positively associated with leisure-time physical activity. Nevertheless, its impact on non leisure-time physical activity is still inconclusive. Lastly, we proposed that acculturation may affect physical activity participation through intrapersonal, interpersonal, and sociocultural streams of influence, adopting the typology of Flay et al.``s (2009) theory of triadic influence.