January/February 2012 Enhancing Intrinsic Motivation in Health Promotion and Wellness Colleen M. Seifert, PhD; Larry S. Chapman, MPH; Joseph K. Hart, JD; Paul Perez, CWPC, PCC Setting the Stage Health promotion and wellness specialists have long held this belief: ‘‘If you build a wellness program to help people lead healthier lives, they will come.’’ And why wouldn’t they? Start with completing a health risk assessment (HRA) and possibly biometric screening; the process alone can potentially be lifesaving, alerting people with conditions such as high cholesterol, hypertension, and diabetes to the significant risk of these conditions. Similarly, the HRA can help identify predisposition to deadly diseases, such as cancer, that require immediate intervention. Who would not want to know the results of such an important assessment? Wellness interventions such as HRAs can build awareness, lead employees towards making better health decisions, and reduce companies’ ever-increasing health care costs. So why aren’t employees participating in large numbers in worksite wellness programs? From our general experience with wellness programs, we’ve seen that offering employees opportu- nities to improve health is simply not enough to cause them to use it. Despite the significant personal advantages from health promotion and wellness programs, many people still do not actively participate. To build intrinsic motivation for change, we believe that individuals need to discover their own rewards for healthy behavior. Employees must be supported within an organizational health culture to build their own goals, enhance their own knowledge, and follow through on their own concrete action steps. Through this health culture, employees can develop their own intrinsic values or incentives that help maintain their efforts towards achieving health goals. This article reviews scientific studies of behavior change that provide a deeper understanding of human motivation. The issues raised address how to design more effective health promotion and wellness programs, and illustrate ways to implement health change programs so that they enhance intrinsic motivation. To help us accomplish this we will be addressing the following topics: N Fundamentals of human motivation N Intrinsic versus extrinsic motivation: Understanding the issues N How do most health promotion programs currently deal with motivation? N Some examples of wellness incentive programs N What does the research literature tell us about motivation? N What programming strategies can be used to enhance intrinsic motivation? Fundamentals of Human Motivation Figure 1 shows the definitions of motivation, along with those for intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, as provided by Wikipedia. 1 It should be recognized that little real consensus exists in the social and educational psychological literature about the exact nature and the practical operation of these core concepts. In This Issue Enhancing Intrinsic Motivation in Health Promotion and Wellness by Colleen M. Seifert, Larry S. Chapman, Joseph K. Hart, and Paul Perez .............................. 1 References ................................ 10 Selected Abstracts ........................... 11 Closing Thoughts, by Larry S. Chapman .......... 12 Editorial Team Editor .................. Larry S. Chapman, MPH Publisher ................... Michael P. O’Donnell, PhD, MBA, MPH Managing Editor .............. Danielle J. Price, MA DOI: 10.4278/ajhp.26.3.tahp TAHP-1