Abstract:
This study was aimed at studying the predictive capacity of selected factors such as personal factors (age, body mass index, level of education, family income, number of children and family characteristics), perceived benefits, perceived barriers, perceived self-efficacy and social support toward exercise behavior among postpartum Thai Muslim women by using Penders Health Promotion Model (Pender, 1996) as the conceptual framework and guideline for the study. The samples were composed of 170 postpartum Thai Muslim women from 6 weeks to 6 months postpartum who returned to recover at home and lived under care of the jurisdiction of Muang district Public Health Centers, Narathiwat, Pattani and Yala or postpartum mothers who came to receive postpartum examinations by appointment at Pattani Hospital and Yala Provincial Health Promotion Hospital on 5 February, 2016 to 31 May, 2016. The study sample was purposive sampled based on set qualifications. Instrumentation was composed of the personal data, the perceived benefits and perceived barriers questionnaire, the perceived self-efficacy questionnaire, the social support questionnaire and the postpartum exercise behavior questionnaire. Data were analyzed by using descriptive statistics and stepwise multiple regression analysis. According to the findings, postpartum Thai Muslim women were found to have little exercise behavior. Social support, perceived barriers, the number of children, family income and perceived benefits were able to jointly predict exercise behavior of postpartum Thai Muslim women and could explain 25.4 percent of the variance of exercise behavior of postpartum Thai Muslim women with statistical significance (p < 0.05).