Today at Brown

David M. Williams goes through three- or four-month periods where he rigorously exercises — on the elliptical trainer, jogging and biking. But the routine eventually becomes boring. Or he gets sick. He subsequently falls off the exercise wagon, sometimes for weeks on end. And then the cycle repeats itself.

“I fall victim to the same kinds of things everybody else does,” Williams said, adding that sometimes he “would rather sit on the couch and watch TV.”

That challenge — motivating people to exercise — is Williams’s field of study as he gears up for a new job this fall: assistant professor of community health at Alpert Medical School.

“It has a major impact on public health,” said Williams, 32, of his field of research. “If you look at epidemiological findings, exercise is inversely related to a bunch of problems, such as cardiovascular disease, obesity, bone health and mental health.”

Williams assumes his new faculty position after having been at Brown in various capacities since 2003. Previously, he was a staff psychologist at the Miriam Hospital’s Centers for Behavioral and Preventive Medicine while he also served as assistant professor (research). He’s now taking a tenure-track position on the Brown faculty.

Williams said he’s happy to be at Brown, in part because the University has a strong research program with internationally renowned researchers in the Alpert Medical School’s public health program.

This “is a good fit with my own interests and an excellent environment for collaboration,” Williams said.

But the question he hopes to answer is a tough one, as researchers lack definitive data on how to motivate people to exercise. That’s because much of the previous research focused on mood or feelings measured before and after exercise and concluded that exercise makes people feel good. The period during which a person actually exercises, it turns out, isn’t so fantastic for everyone and can turn people off of exercise.

“More recently, research has shown that when you look at the way people feel while they are exercising is usually not too good,” Williams said. “For folks that are not regularly active — which is a majority of the population — and for folks who are overweight or obese, they may never get to the point where they are feeling good while exercising in any given exercise bout.”

On the other hand, Williams notes that people who complete exercise often feel good, whether it is because of a sense of accomplishment, a release of endorphins, or the fact that “the unpleasantness is now over.” Because it is a more immediate outcome, it is often the bad feelings that people experience during exercise that prevents them from sticking to an exercise regimen.

Williams is already studying whether folks can be motivated to exercise if they are told to make sure their heart rate reaches a minimum level, as recommended in current national guidelines, or whether long-term adherence to exercise is more likely if people are told to exercise at a pace that makes them feel good. He has also been exploring whether exercise can help people quit smoking more easily.

Williams, a married father of two children, has his Bachelor of Science degree in psychology from Richard Stockton College in Pomona, N.J., and his M.S. and Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Virginia Tech.

He became interested in sports psychology at college, where he played Division III NCAA soccer. An undergraduate adviser suggested he should pursue a clinical health psychology program instead.

“Once I got to graduate school,” he added, “I decided that helping people to exercise regularly is just a lot more important.”