Director of Physical Activity Epidemiology Laboratory (PAEL), Zan Gao,PhD, has recently published a research article titled “Investigating the Associations among Drug Dependents’ Family Function and Exercise Attitudes: Marital Status Differences” as the corresponding author in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. The first-author of this paper is Jianing Liu, a visiting scholar under Dr. Gao’s mentorship. The second author is Daniel J. McDonough, a PhD student in the lab. 

This paper examined (1) The demographic characteristics of different marital statuses of drug dependents; (2) differences in exercise attitudes and family function by marital status; and (3) if family function factors correlated with exercise attitudes and if exercise attitude factors correlated with family function. Participants were 1830 drug dependents from the Drug Rehabilitation Bureau in China. Findings of this study were: (1) Exercise attitude and family function of married drug dependents were better than single drug dependents and other marital status addicts; (2) communication was observed as a factor of family function that correlated with exercise attitude; and (3) willingness was related with family function.

Learn more about the article here.