ABSTRACT
Exercise programmes have become quite popular in a wide variety of organizational settings. The primary rationale for offering such programmes is that employees who exercise will be physically healthier than non-exercisers, and that such differences will decrease organizational health care costs. The primary advantage of true experimentation over other research methods is that causal relationships can be readily determined. A simple hypothetical example of a true experiment would be to assign randomly twenty subjects to fifteen week exercise programmes and twenty others to a control group or non-exercise condition. At the end of the fifteen week period, these two groups would be compared on measures of psychological functioning. Correlational studies simply seek to demonstrate covariation between exercise participation and mental health. Compared with experiments and quasi-experiments, correlational studies are much easier to conduct. In most exercise studies, especially those conducted in organizational settings, people self-select into either formal or self-directed exercise programmes.
