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Abstract
Sedentary behavior (SB) has negative mental health consequences, yet older adults spend most waking hours engaged in SB. Most of the research focusing on relations between SB and mental health uses contextless, summary-based measures. Therefore, it is unclear how SB occurring in specific contexts and domains impacts affective states in real-time and real-world environments. Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA) can overcome limitations of previous research by pairing accelerometers and smartphones to capture behaviors of interest (and the contexts surrounding those behaviors) as they occur in naturalistic settings. To date, all but one EMA study assessing the relationships between SB and affect have used random prompting schedules which may miss occasions of SB, fail to assess affect and contextual features during bouts of SB, or not account for the duration of SB. The current study used an event-contingent EMA prompting schedule triggering EMA prompts after 30 minutes of continuous SB to (1) determine momentary contextual factors (i.e., physical and social context, and domain type) associated with affective responses during SB and (2) determine the extent to which mental engagement and mind wandering in SB moderates the association between SB domain type (screen-based vs not) and affective responses during a bout of SB. Older adults (n = 86, Mage = 71 years, 71% Female, 79% White, 20% Black or African American, MBMI = 27.65) wore an accelerometer and carried a smartphone for seven days. The accelerometer triggered a smartphone-based questionnaire after a 30-minute bout of SB to capture affect, momentary contextual factors, mental engagement, and mind wandering in real-time. Results for Aim 1 revealed that at the between-person level, older adults who, on average, engaged in a greater proportion of SB occasions outdoors experienced more positive affect (b = 24.517, SE = 11.601, p = 0.035) and less negative affect (b = -0.638, SE = 0.302, p =0.034) but these associations were not present at the within-person level (Positive Affect: b = -0.904, SE = 1.487, p = 0.543, Negative Affect: b = 0.075, SE = 0.046, p = 0.102). There was no association between social context and positive affect at the within-person level (b = 1.345, SE = 0.979, p = 0.169) or between-person level (b = 1.868, SE = 4.741, p = 0.694). However, older adults who, on average, engaged in a greater proportion of SB occasions alone experienced less negative affect (b = -0.259, SE = 0.120, p = 0.031) compared to those who reported less SB occasions alone at the between-person level. There was a negative association between social context and negative affect at the within-person level (b = -0.073, SE = 0.027, p = 0.006). In other words, on occasions when older adults engaged in a 30-minute bout of SB while alone, they experienced less negative affect compared to with other people. There was no within-person association between domain type and positive affect (b = 0.391, SE = 0.874, p = 0.655) or negative affect (b = -0.028, SE = 0.024, p = 0.249). There was also no between-person association between domain type and negative affect (b = 0.222, SE = 0.172, p = 0.195). However, there was a negative between-person association between domain type and positive affect (b = -15.116, SE = 6442, p = 0.019) suggesting that older adults who, on average, engaged in a greater proportion of SB occasions using a screen-based device experienced less positive affect compared to those who reported using a screen-based device during SB on a smaller proportion of occasions. Results for Aim 2 revealed no difference in associations between SB domain type and positive affect (b = -0.049, SE = 0.054, p = 0.386) or negative affect (b = 0.001, SE = 0.001, p = 0.672) depending on the degree of mental engagement at the within-person level. Further, there was no difference in associations between SB domain type and positive affect (b = 3.654, SE = 2.684, p = 0.173) or negative affect (b = 0.018, SE = 0.075, p = 0.810) depending on mind wandering at the within-person level. However, mental engagement, but not mind wandering, was associated with more positive affect (Between-person: b = 0.498, SE = 0.073, p < 0.001, Within-person: b = 0.177, SE= 0.041, p < 0.001) and less negative affect (Between-person: b = -0.009, SE = 0.002, p < 0.001, Within-person: b = -0.004, SE = 0.001, p = 0.001) highlighting that mental engagement during SB may influence affective responses more so than the SB domain engaged in during SB. These findings suggest that interventions should move beyond solely aiming to reduce total SB and instead focus on limiting specific types of SB in specific contexts that contribute to poor mental health and well-being.