Development of a short version of the perceived benefits and barriers to exercise scale

Background: Perceived benefits and barriers to exercise are important correlates of exercise participation. Purpose: To develop a short version of the perceived benefits and barriers to exercise scale and to examine its validity and reliability. Methods: A population-based cross-sectional study of 865 participants (age: 20-69 years old, men: 46.5%) was conducted in four cities in Japan (Koganei, Tshukuba, Shizuoka, Kagoshima). Perceived benefits and barriers scale including five benefit subscales (physical benefit, psychological benefit, social benefit, weight management, self-improvement) with 10 items, five barrier subscales (discomfort, lack of motivation, lack of time, lack of social support, poor physical environment) with 10 items and stage of change for exercise behavior were assessed by self-administered questionnaire. Results: Confirmatory factor analyses to examine the construct validity revealed acceptable fit indices (benefit scale: GFI=.980, AGFI=.951, RMSEA=.058, AIC=151.669, barrier scale: GFI=.973, AGFI=.949, RMSEA=.060, AIC=166.084). Seven of ten subscales indicated significant linear associations with stage of change for exercise behavior, criterion-related validity was revealed. The reliability of the scale was found to be good as internal consistency and inter-rater reliability. Conclusion: The short version of the perceived benefits and barriers scale developed in this study demonstrated acceptable construct validity, criterion-related validity, internal consistency and inter-rater reliability.