Background: Physical activity is essential for health and wellbeing. However, many individuals fail to reach the recommended levels and obesity rates are increasing. Health-related social control refers to strategies employed by 1 person (agent) to influence another person's (target) health behavior. These strategies can be classified into persuasion (eg, encouraging or motivating) or pressure (eg, nagging or coercing). However, much of the existing research is cross-sectional and mostly focuses on the experiences of the targets.
Purpose: This study investigates how persuasion and pressure within overweight romantic couples relate to outcomes in both agents and targets. Specifically, it examines same-day associations with positive and negative affect, as well as physical activity.
Methods: This study is a secondary analysis of the 14-day follow-up period from a randomized controlled trial. Accelerometers and daily diaries tracked 99 overweight romantic couples. For each outcome and each partner, separate multilevel models were fitted.
Results: Daily persuasion used by agents was associated with increased physical activity in targets and a more favorable affect in agents. Daily pressure was not associated with the physical activity of either partner but was linked to a more unfavorable affect in the agent. Both persuasion and pressure were unrelated to the targets' affect.
Conclusions: Health-related social control in romantic relationships relates to same-day outcomes of both agents and targets. Our findings suggest that health behavior change interventions and weight loss programs could benefit from encouraging persuasion and limiting pressure.
Keywords: health behavior change; health-related social control; intensive longitudinal; romantic couples; social influence strategies.
Physical activity is essential for health and wellbeing, yet many people struggle to be active enough. In romantic relationships, partners sometimes try to influence each other to be more active. This is known as social control and involves attempts to regulate the other person’s behavior, for example by trying to persuade the other or by using pressure. Research shows that using persuasion can help the other partner to be more physically active, while pressure is often ineffective and can leave them feeling worse. However, little is known about how the partner exerting social control feels or responds in these situations or how social control plays out in daily life. In this study, we followed 99 overweight couples over 2 weeks, using activity trackers and daily questionnaires. We found that on days when 1 partner used more persuasion, the other partner was more physically active, and the persuading partner felt better. In contrast, pressure was unrelated to physical activity, and the partner applying pressure felt worse. These findings suggest that social control is related to both partners’ experiences on the same day. Health promotion programs could leverage the influence of romantic partners by encouraging the use of persuasion while minimizing pressure.
© The Author(s) 2025. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society of Behavioral Medicine.