Inbrief: Mar/Apr 2000

Intervention Focus
Jeanne F. Nichols Elizabeth Wellman Susan Caparosa James F. Sallis Karen J. Calfas Russell Rowe	Applied Research Briefs: Fitness; Behavior Change Impact of a Worksite Behavioral Skills Intervention Sixty-four male and female sedentary employees were randomly assigned to an intervention group or control group to determine the effects of behavioral skill training on adoption and maintenance of exercise. Both received a 9-month membership at a local fitness facility. The control group received a 12-week semi structured course, which included a facility orientation and three meetings with a personal trainer. The intervention group received a 12-week behavioral skills course and were encouraged to participate in a 12-week semi structured exercise course followed by a 3-month problem-solving support intervention. Both groups improved their daily energy expenditure, the amount of moderate and vigorous activity they performed, and their strength and flexibility. The study sample was too small to show substantial differences between the intervention and control group. Changes in mediator variables were mixed.
	Nutrition
Leslie A. Lytle Sara Seifert Jessica Greenstein Paul McGovern	How Do Children's Eating Patterns and Food Choices Change Over Time? Results from a Cohort Study Individual 24-hour dietary recall measures were taken for 291 students in Minnesota schools in 3rd, 5th, and 8th grades. During this period, consumption of breakfast dropped from 99% to 85%, fruit consumption dropped 41%, and vegetable consumption dropped 25%. The portion of beverages coming from soft drinks tripled, and fruit juice consumption dropped 27%.
	Smoking Control
Leonard A. Jason Richard Katz Steven B. Pokorny Mark Engstrom Georgina Tegart Carrie Curie	The Relationship Between Youth Tobacco Control Enforcement and Crime Rates in a Midwestern County The crime rate in 29 counties was compared with the level of enforcement of laws restricting youth purchases. There was a linear relationship between crime rate and enforcement. Communities with the highest enforcement policies had the lowest crime rates.
	Applied Research Briefs
Dianne Neumark-Sztainer Stacy L. Martin Mary Story	School-based programs for Obesity Prevention: What Do Adolescents Recommend? Twenty-five focus groups were conducted with 203 adolescent boys and girls from junior high and high schools in St. Paul, Minnesota, showed that students want weight control programs that are fun, interactive, accessible, convenient, low in cost, sensitive to the needs of adolescents, include multiple physical activity options, and be offered to all students, regardless of their weight.
	Stress Management; Social Health
Joseph G. Grzywacz	Work-Family Spill over and Health During Midlife: Is Managing Conflict Everything? A cross-sectional analysis of self-reported data from 1547 employed adults aged 35-65 years examined the relationship between positive and negative spillover between work and home and a number of health measures. Negative spillover was associated with bad health measures, and positive spillovers were associated with positive health measures, including self-reported measures of physical and mental health, chronic health problems, and overall well-being.
Strategies
	Culture Change; Health Policy
Lucie Levesque Lucie Richard Louise Potvin	The Ecological Approach in Tobacco-Control Practice: Health Promotion Practitioner Characteristics Related to Using the Ecological Approach Questionnaires measuring cognitive and personal factors, as well as attempts to integrate different types of ecological strategies in professional practice, were sent to 659 Canadian health professionals involved in youth tobacco control programming; 524 responses (79.5%) were received. Most respondents knew about the ecological approach, were receptive to and worked in a setting that supported the concept, and had made efforts to apply the concept, but had values inconsistent with the concept. Perceived competency, group norms, and knowledge of the ecological concept were the best predictors of the strategies people used to implement programs. Also, nurses were more likely to implement interpersonal change strategies.
Research
Brian F. Oldenburgh Margot L. French James F. Sallis	Methods, Issues, and Results in Evaluation and Research Health Behavior Research: The Quality of the Evidence Base All 1210 manuscripts published in the 12 most prestigious health promotion research journals in 1994 were reviewed and coded based on stage of research and setting. Of the total, 34% were non research articles, 35% were health-behavior research, and 31% were related to innovation, diffusion, and institutionalization. Of the 469 health behavior research articles, 57% were observation studies, 11% were methods development, 19% were intervention studies, 1% were meta-analyses, and 13% addressed diffusion and institutionalization. Half (46) of the intervention studies had randomized controlled designs. Studies were conducted in nonspecific community settings (206), health care settings (88), schools (75), specific community settings (53), workplaces (32), and universities (11).
Critical Issues and Trends
Ron Z. Goetzel Ronald J. Ozminkowski	Health and Productivity Management: Emerging Opportunities for Health Promotion Professionals for the 21st Century The authors recognize the emergence of health and productivity management as an important stage in the evolution of workplace health promotion and describe how health promotion professionals should take the lead in redirecting their employers efforts to work together.
Michael P. O'Donnell	Health and Productivity Management: The Concept, Impact and Opportunity; Commentary to Goetzel and Ozminkowski The author describes a model linking health, productivity and profit, why productivity is so important to business, and the potential impact productivity enhancement can have on health promotion.

Abstracts	16 abstracts are featured from a variety of publications.
DataBase: Research and Evaluation Results	Four new studies are critiqued and are added to the DataBase chart.