Rationale for participation in university worksite wellness programs

Abstract

Objective: To understand the wellness needs of university employees to design more effective and inclusive worksite wellness programs (WWP) for health promotion. Methods: Cross-sectional assessment of university employees’ wellness needs (online survey, n = 639). Results: Employees were most interested in physical activity (PA), nutrition, and lifestyle WWP. Principal barriers to participation were time, scheduling, location, motivation, and confidentiality concerns. Significant correlations exist between having a diagnosed health condition and the likelihood of participating in related programs. 67.1% of past participation was predicted by (1) health status today versus last year, (2) use of university recreational facilities, (3) gender, (4) general health status, (5) PA in the past month, (6) faculty/staff, and (7) age. Conclusions: Our findings contribute to building a road map of how-to better design university WWP based on understanding participation predictors, barriers/facilitators, and the influence of health status/conditions on topics of interest/participation. Tailoring WWP to meet employees’ needs may increase reach, engagement and promote a health culture.

Keywords:

• Employee wellness
• health promotion
• university employees
• wellness survey
• worksite wellness programs

Acknowledgments

We express our gratitude to Tara Torkelson, JMU’s Work Life & Engagement Specialist, for her valuable input in the design of the “Faculty and Staff Wellness Program Interest Survey”.

Conflict of interest disclosure

The authors have no conflicts of interest to report. The authors confirm that the research presented in this article met the ethical guidelines, including adherence to the legal requirements, of the United States and received approval from the Institutional Review Board of James Madison University.

Ethics

This study was approved by the Institutional Review Board (IRB) at James Madison University (20-1203).

Funding

No funding was used to support this research and/or the preparation of the manuscript.