Effects of music, television, and a combination entertainment system on distraction, exercise adherence, and physical output in adults

Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science, Jul 2001 by James J Annesi

Research on the internal-external attentional focus dichotomy has its basis in the sport performance (especially distance running) literature. Studies have found that association, or the increase of attentional focus on bodily sensations, was consistent with increased physical performance (e.g., Masters & Lambert, 1989; Scott, Scott, Bedic, & Dowd, 1999; Tammen, 1996). However, nonelite participants tended to gravitate toward the use of distraction strategies (Morgan & Pollack, 1977; Silva & Applebaum, 1989). This suggested that "typical" individuals had a preference for distancing themselves from discomfort during physical activity. This seemed to have intuitive implications for exercise adherence promotion. It was assumed that if participants could effectively distract themselves from noxious physical sensations, exercise would be more easily tolerated.

Researchers have, however, expressed varying opinions about the benefits of an internal vs. external attentional focus for maintaining new physical activity programs. Kimiecik (1999), for example, hypothesized that while distraction was beneficial for beginning exercisers, "Dissociation alone is insufficient to enable clients to change and maintain exercise behavior" (p. 39). He made the point that a desirable "flow state" (which requires a focused absorption in an activity inprogress) was not possible with the exclusive use of distraction and proposed that the quality of the experience would suffer, as would adherence. In a comprehensive review, however, Masters and Ogles (1998) came to a very different conclusion regarding the impact of an external attentional focus on exercise maintenance. They stated that for adherence to be maximized, sensations of discomfort should be minimized throughout. They wrote, "This argues for using dissociation as a training technique, leading to improved adherence by increasing the self-reinforcing properties of the run or workout..." (p. 268). They referenced 26 studies produced in both laboratory and field settings that uniformly pointed to the benefits of an external focus for maximizing maintenance of regular exercise and physical outputs. They acknowledged, however, considerable methodological limitations of many of the published studies.

Because of threats such as expectation and questionable motivation, the ability to generalize laboratory results to practice settings has been questioned (Masters & Ogles, 1998); however, a number of notable findings have been offered through such controlled experimentation. Using a leg lift endurance task, Weinberg, Smith, Jackson, and Gould (1984) found that groups using an external focus and positive selftalk outperformed an internal focus and control conditions. Also using leg lift tasks, both Spink (1988) and Gill and Strom (1985) found distraction to be more effective at maximizing physical performances than association or control conditions. Rejeski and Kenney (1987) manipulated the type of distraction strategy (simple/complex) used for a task of maintaining an isometric contraction on a handgrip dynamometer. Both distraction strategies produced better results than a control. Some evidence was also found indicating that individuals may do best when they are matched with a preferred external focus style. Again using a leg lift task, Weinberg (1985) was the first to account for a personal characteristic's interaction with cognitive strategy. It was found that high self-efficacy was a better predictor of performance than the use of distraction or positive self-talk. This was a notable finding and suggested that level of the trait of selfmotivation, a previously used predictor of exercise maintenance (Merkle, Jackson, Dishman, & Zhang, 1998), may also be important to account for in future research. Again, the laboratory nature of the preceding investigations were noted to be of concern for practice implications.