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Bang, Lee, Kim, Song, and Park: The Effects of Urban Forest-walking Program on Health Promotion Behavior, Physical Health, Depression, and Quality of Life: A Randomized Controlled Trial of Office-workers
Original Article

Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing 2016; 46(1): 140-148.

Published online: 29 February 2016

DOI: https://doi.org/10.4040/jkan.2016.46.1.140

The Effects of Urban Forest-walking Program on Health Promotion Behavior, Physical Health, Depression, and Quality of Life: A Randomized Controlled Trial of Office-workers

Kyung-Sook Bang1, In-sook Lee1, Sung-Jae Kim1, Min Kyung Song2, Se-Eun Park2

1College of Nursing·The Research Institute of Nursing Science, Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea.

2College of Nursing, Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea.

Address reprint requests to: Song, Min Kyung. College of Nursing·Seoul National University, 103 Daehak-ro, Jongno-gu, Seoul 03080, Korea. Tel: +82-2-740-8467, Fax: +82-2-765-4103, mk0408@snu.ac.kr

Received 30 June 2015       Revised 23 July 2015       Accepted 11 November 2015

© 2016 Korean Society of Nursing Science

(open-access):

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution NoDerivs License. (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/) If the original work is properly cited and retained without any modification or reproduction, it can be used and re-distributed in any format and medium.

Abstract

Purpose

This study was performed to determine the physical and psychological effects of an urban forest-walking program for office workers. For many workers, sedentary lifestyles can lead to low levels of physical activity causing various health problems despite an increased interest in health promotion.

Methods

Fifty four office workers participated in this study. They were assigned to two groups (experimental group and control group) in random order and the experimental group performed 5 weeks of walking exercise based on Information-Motivation-Behavioral skills Model. The data were collected from October to November 2014. SPSS 21.0 was used for the statistical analysis.

Results

The results showed that the urban forest walking program had positive effects on the physical activity level (U=65.00, p <.001), health promotion behavior (t= - 2.20, p =.033), and quality of life (t= - 2.42, p =.020). However, there were no statistical differences in depression, waist size, body mass index, blood pressure, or bone density between the groups.

Conclusion

The current findings of the study suggest the forest-walking program may have positive effects on improving physical activity, health promotion behavior, and quality of life. The program can be used as an effective and efficient strategy for physical and psychological health promotion for office workers.

Keywords: Forests, Walking, Health promotion, Depression, Quality of life

Figures and Tables

Figure 1

CONSORT flow diagram.

jkan-46-140-g001
Figure 2

The conceptual model of the forest-walking program.

jkan-46-140-g002
Table 1

Homogeneity Test of General Characteristics and Outcome Variables in Pre-test (N=45)

jkan-46-140-i001

Exp.=Experimental group; Cont.=Control group; BMI=Body mass index; BP=Blood pressure.

Table 2

Comparison of Outcome Variables between Two Groups in Posttest (N=45)

jkan-46-140-i002

*Measured by ANCOVA with pre-test score as covariates; Exp.=Experimental group; Cont.=Control group; BP=Blood pressure; BMI=Body mass index.

Notes

This work was supported by SNU Brain Fusion Program of the Seoul National University in 2014.

CONFLICTS OF INTEREST The authors declared no conflict of interest.

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