EXAMINING THE RELATIONSHIPS OF MOTIVATIONS WITH BEHAVIORAL GOAL ACHIEVEMENT AND WEIGHT LOSS IN A PILOT RANDOMIZED TRIAL OF JUST-IN-TIMEADAPTIVE INTERVENTION MESSAGING

<p class="p1"><em>Young adults are at risk of obesity and weight gain due to a variety of factors, including </em><em>major life changes such as moving out and adulthood. To date, there have been few programs </em><em>that have provided highly personalized, in-the-moment messaging to promote weight </em><em>management among young adults. Just-In-Time-Adaptive-Interventions (JITAI) have the </em><em>potential to promote adherence to daily weight-related behaviors in weight loss interventions for </em><em>young adults, by providing the right type of intervention support at the right time. However, </em><em>limited research has examined the relationships between motivations to engage in weight management </em><em>behaviors and adherence to daily goals within these interventions. The objective of </em><em>this study was to investigate whether baseline motivations (autonomous (AM), controlled (CM), </em><em>relative autonomy index (RAI)) and changes in motivations were associated with goal adherence </em><em>and weight loss in a 12-week pilot micro-randomized trial of JITAI messaging among young </em><em>adults (n=52). Using independent sample t-tests, we compared participants who reported higher </em><em>vs. lower motivation (to eat a healthy diet, exercise, weigh themselves) on achievement of daily </em><em>goals (eating, active minutes, weighing) and weight loss over 12 weeks.</em>