A System Identification Approach to Dynamically Modeling and Understanding Physical Activity Behaviors
Year: 2016
Type: dissertation
Abstract: : The lack of healthy behaviors - such as physical activity and balanced diet - in\n\nmodern society is responsible for a large number of diseases and high mortality rates in\n\nthe world. Adaptive behavioral interventions have been suggested as a way to promote\n\nsustained behavioral changes to address these issues. These adaptive interventions\n\ncan be modeled as closed-loop control systems, and thus applying control systems\n\nengineering and system identification principles to behavioral settings might provide\n\na novel way of improving the quality of such interventions.\n\nGood understanding of the dynamic processes involved in behavioral experiments\n\nis a fundamental step in order to design such interventions with control systems ideas.\n\nIn the present work, two different behavioral experiments were analyzed under the\n\nlight of system identification principles and modelled as dynamic systems.\n\nIn the first study, data gathered over the course of four days served as the basis for\n\nARX modeling of the relationship between psychological constructs (negative affect\n\nand self-efficacy) and the intensity of physical activity. The identified models suggest\n\nthat this behavioral process happens with self-regulation, and that the relationship\n\nbetween negative affect and self-efficacy is represented by a second order underdamped\n\nsystem with negative gain, while the relationship between self-efficacy and physical\n\nactivity level is an overdamped second order system with positive gain.\n\nIn the second study, which consisted of single-bouts of intense physical activity,\n\nthe relation between a more complex set of behavioral variables was identified as a\n\nsemi-physical model, with a theoretical set of system equations derived from behavioral\n\ntheory. With a prescribed set of physical activity intensities, it was found that less fit\n\nparticipants were able to get higher increases in affective state, and that self-regulation\n\nprocesses are also involved in the system.
Language: English
Topic: Physical Activity and Health
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7062428266