Question 1.

The targeted behaviour I have chosen to change is exercising regularly (3 times a week). I used to go for a walk or run quite often last year, about 5 days a week for 30 minutes. It really helped me cope with day to day stress and overthinking and made me feel better about myself. But, ever since I started 3^rd year of Psychology, exercising has completely disappeared from my routine because I finish university late evening and get real lazy and tired when I reach home. So I think this is a great opportunity to get exercising back in my routine. I’m very excited to try this experiment. If this ends up helping me bring positive changes in my life, then this will be my number one priority to make changes with this knowledge. (feedback from the teacher – Good subjective justification but this section should have been written in third person using scientific language and expression as would be done in a research proposal. Additional reference to theory would have also helped you build a strong rationale)

Question 2.

The participant has decided to measure the durationand frequencyof exercisingoccurs in a week. The exercises can be broken down to walking, running or jogging. If exercises such as those does not occur because it’s too dark to walk outside, going for a walk around the house can also be taken under consideration.However, the exercise has to be at least for 30 minutes whether it’s at home or outside. This will not give the participant an excuse to not exercise.It is predicted exercising helps to cope with stress, improve sleep and helps to control weight. Wack, Crosland, and Miltenberger (2014) conducted a study to see if goal setting and self-monitoring could be effective in increasing running distance for adults who wishes to increase their existence. Wack and Colleagues found that setting daily or weekly goals and self-monitoring progress toward those goals increased running distance for all participants.

Question 3.

The participant has developed a weekly timetable on the computer. The timetable includes a space to record the time and duration that she exercised, 3 days of the week and also another space to record the goals for the day. The table will look something like this:

Positive Consequences: Stress free, healthy lifestyle, relaxed, control of weight, fit, both Improvements in Mental and Physical health, time management

Negative Consequences: Commitments, time consuming, hungry after exercise, stressed, sleep difficulties.

Creating a positive/negative consequence of the intervention behaviours helps to motivate and increases chances of achievement and success. It gives an idea to whether you want a positive change or negative change in your day to day activities. (Teacher comment – It appears you have misinterpreted this component. This should refer to events or behaviors occurring peripherally which may impact the intervention or behavior of focus, not the other way around. For example, it may be raining (antecedent). As a result, you may not go for a run (negative consequence).

Question 4.

The participant’s ultimate goal for this study is to exercise 7 days a week for 30 minutes. This will start with 30 minutes on 3 days each week and increase the number of days each week and then reach the goal. After each exercise, the time, duration and place will be recorded on the timetable. The timetable is printed out and is put on the wall near the mirror in the room where it can get noticed frequently so it increases the likelihood of the exercise to occur frequently, the participant’s sets an alarm clock after coming back from work or university so that it would be there as a reminder to keep exercising. S

Question 5.

The participant created a reinforcement for the act in order for the behavioural intervention is reinforces and helps to get closer to the goals. If the participant follows the rules and runs 3 times a week for 30 minutes, she will be rewarded with a chocolate for the first week. For the second week, if the participant manages to increase the days in the second week, she is will be rewarded to go shopping and buy something for herself. If she manages to fulfil all the goals at the end of the behavioural intervention she will be awarded with her favourite food. The reasons to why these reinforces are chosen is because she has tried cutting down chocolate from her diet and this would be an excuse to reward herself for the first week. For the second reinforcement, shopping was chosen because she’s saving up and haven’t bought herself anything for a long time, so this reinforcement will also motivate her towards the goals. For the overall reinforcement, favourite food was chosen, as she loves and enjoys the food she loves to eat.

If the goals aren’t fulfilled in the first week reinforcement will be taken away as an award. If the goals aren’t fulfilled in the second week, 15 minutes will be added to every exercise and also the reinforcement for going shopping also removed. Therefore, if the goals for both weeks aren’t successful then the reinforcement will also be taken away.

Question 6.

This single subject design, can help successfully increase or change the self-intervened behaviour. Self-management behaviour is when a person uses behaviour modification procedures to change his or her own behaviour (Raymond G, 2016). This helps to increase the achieved outcome in the future. This will be a great experiment to do if one wants to decrease bad behaviour and increase the likelihood of a good behaviour to take place. If the participant’s intervention behaviouris successful, it will make her feel relaxed, healthy, stress free, as well as decreases overthinking. This will help her with her studies, work load and life situations and helps her patient.