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There are multiple avenues to gain health promoting and disease preventing benefits of physical activity (PA) but nonadherence makes health benefits short-lived. Gains obtained through structured exercise training and therapy quickly decay once participants leave programs. Scientific position statements underscore cognitive-behavioral strategies (CBS) as an essential intervention component to increase and maintain PA and recommend transfer of CBS knowledge to practice. Our review of reviews indicates high quality PA interventions involving CBS consistently demonstrate medium effect sizes. Kinesiologists are the human resource capacity to translate this knowledge. Building capacity to implement CBS knowledge is potentially large given North American kinesiology programs and American College of Sports Medicine and Canadian Society for Exercise Physiology certification routes. Yet CBS training of kinesiologists by universities and organizations is minimal. Immediate change in CBS training and practice is needed. Professional organizations/institutions can either be leaders in developing human resources or part of the problem should they fail to address the challenge of CBS training.

In this paper, we argue that the social influence of the group is a supportive medium for older adult thriving. To promote the physical well-being aspect of thriving, we discuss groups as one means of offering social support. We present a specific model of physical activity intervention (i.e., group-mediated cognitive behavioral intervention) that uses deliberately-formed interactive groups to help motivate older adults to engage in and sustain physical activity. Our article includes four sections that concern the GMCB intervention model. The first serves as background as to why groups can be powerful behavior change agents and describes the basic model of group motivated intervention. The second section provides a generic description of the intervention structure and how the GMCB intervention is conducted. The third section presents a meta-analytic summary of results of older adult GMCB physical activity interventions across three levels of outcomes: adherence to physical activity, functional and physiological, and social cognitive. The fourth section concludes with commentary about the translational perspective for the GMCB in the future.

We evaluated the accuracy and precision of wearable activity trackers and a pedometer (ATPs) in estimating steps and sedentary time (ST) in free-living settings. Thirty-two healthy men and women (M ± SD: age = 32.3 ± 13.3 years; BMI = 24.4 ± 3.3 kg·m⁻²) were directly observed during three, 2-hour sessions on different days while wearing 10 devices and a biometric shirt. A validated direct observation (DO) system provided criterion measures for steps and ST. For steps, bias ranged from −753 steps/2-hrs (Fitbit Flex) to −57 steps/2-hrs (Polar Loop) and CIs ranged from [−1,144, −365] (Fitbit Flex) to [−291,175] (Polar Loop) steps/2-hrs. For all devices, step estimates were strongly correlated (r = 0.90 [Fitbit Flex] to r = 0.97 [New Lifestyles pedometer model 1000]) with DO counted steps. Estimates of ST were not accurate and were weakly correlated (r = −0.06 and r = 0.06 for Fitbit Flex and Fitbit One, respectively) with DO ST. Most ATPs were not accurate and varied in precision in estimating steps and ST in free-living settings. Implications from this study are that although point estimates of steps from ATPs are not accurate, ATPs’ ranking of step counts among individuals was high. However, the Fitbit Flex and Fitbit One are not recommended for estimating ST. This study advances our understanding of the performance of ATPs in estimating steps and ST in free-living settings, and significantly advances activity tracker and pedometer validation studies.