Physical Activity Training and Middle-Aged Females’ Quality of Life

Abstract

Background: Despite the great benefits of physical activity, immobility is still a major health problem among females. Regular physical activity is associated with higher levels of health status and better quality of life. Objectives: The current study aimed to evaluate the effects of physical activity training on middle-aged females’ quality of life. Methods: This randomized controlled field trial was conducted on 88 middle-aged females who referred to Nehbandan district healthcare center, Nehbandan, Iran. The females were randomly and evenly allocated into a control and an experimental group. Then, an eight-session physical activity training program was implemented for the females in the experimental group. Study data were collected both before and one month after the intervention on a self-report basis and by the short-form 36-item quality of life questionnaire (SF-36) and two seven-choice questions to assess the length of physical activity in the past two weeks. Finally, the data were transferred to the SPSS ver. 16 and analyzed through running the Kolmogorov-Smirnov, the paired- and the independent-samples T, the Mann-Whitney U, the Wilcoxon, and the Chi-square tests. The level of significance was 0.05. Results: Before the intervention, the means of quality of life in the experimental and the control groups were 67.77 ± 17.39 and 67.57 ± 14.18 which increased respectively to 81.66 ± 11.88 and 69.00 ± 14.81 after the intervention. The difference between the groups regarding the pretest values of quality of life was not statistically significant (P = 0.72); while after the intervention, this difference was statistically significant (P = 0.001). On the other hand, the pretest mean values of physical activity duration in the groups were 45.00 ± 30.53 and 43.24 ± 42.31 which increased respectively to 158.45 ± 53.35 and 58.75 ± 55.39 minutes after the intervention. Again, intergroup difference regarding the pretest values of physical activity duration was insignificant (P = 0.82); while after the intervention, this difference was statistically significant (P = 0.001). Conclusions: Active engagement in physical activities has positive effects on middle-aged females’ quality of life. Therefore, developing and implementing training intervention is recommended to improve middle-aged females’ quality of life.