Personal Improvement Project

1. Personal Improvement Project Does Changing My Environment Lead to a Significant Decrease in Abstaining from Snacking? S.N. HSCI 586 Fall 2004 Dr. Alemi

2. You have my permission to include this presentation among those that are posted on the CQI website

3. Problem? • Too much time at home alone, not enough activities to stay busy • Leads to mindless and unnecessary snacking • Led to weight gain over seven month period

4. Solution? • Change my environment in order to not have so much time home alone HOW?? --Evaluate daily routines --Look for opportunities for improvement or change --Change environment to not have so much time home alone --Evaluate Daily Routine: Follow….

14. Necessary to Change Routines: --Left home after dinner, socialize with friend --Took snack in car on way to class to lessen the urge to snack before dinner --Create activities to replace with at-home down time: ran errands weekday evenings I used to run on weekends --Changed environment rather than change myself

15. Data Collection for Evidence • Collected data on snacking from beginning of observation period (every day: snacked or didn’t snack) • Pre-intervention period (10 days) and post-intervention period (82 days) documented • Time-between chart used to document chances of snacking – 92 Data Points total over the course of the semester

16. Results from Time-Between Chart

17. Conclusion • Changing environment lead to improvement in habits (decrease in snacking), though additional environmental changes should be made to create a more significant difference • Lost approximately 6 pounds over the course of the semester • Personal improvement can happen with little to no conscious effort as long as environment is changed • Periods of abstaining from snacking were longer after intervention • I should continue to change my environment possibly introducing other factors to continue to abstain from snacking