From Research to Real Life: Insights on Lifestyle Interventions with Dr Justine Anthony

Recently Dr Grace Tidmarsh had the pleasure of catching up with Dr Justine Anthony to talk about her research within health inequalities faced by those with severe mental illness, and helpful tips that you can use when thinking about physical activity in your own life.

Dr Anthony (pictured below is an Early Career Fellow in the School of Psychology and Vision Sciences, at the University of Leicester. Her research considers the increased vulnerability of people with severe mental illness of developing non-communicable physical health conditions, namely cardiometabolic issues. Her work extends to the design and development of lifestyle interventions (particularly physical activity) aimed at improving health outcomes in various populations. She is particularly interested in using co-production methods to explore how lifestyle interventions can be most successfully integrated into routine care.

Image description: Pictured Dr Justine Anthony, has dark brown hair and wears a grey jumper.

Let’s get started and find out more about Justine and her work!

1. What have you been doing since you completed your PhD in physical activity and physical health for adolescents?

“I finished my PhD in at the end of 2021 and I went straight into a Postdoc after that, remaining at Loughborough University with same supervisory team in a very similar area but in a slightly different population. So, instead of adolescents we were working with adults within secure psychiatric care, and this project built on a previous colleague's PhD where she had developed a staff e-learning intervention around promoting physical activity in secure care. We had found that just having e-learning alone wasn't doing a great deal, so we wanted to create something, maybe a bit more interactive that people could have on the wards. So, this project focused on co-producing what we call a physical activity toolkit; a series of resources and sort of tips and advice on how staff can promote physical activity and how patients can engage in physical activity within that ward environment with a lot more focus on that practical aspect. Essentially taking that knowledge that they got from the e-learning and then implementing it in practice.”

“In 2023 I left Loughborough University and moved to Leicester University as an Early Career Fellow. This is an independent research position where we are supported to develop our own independent research programme. So, I'm still working in this area, looking at physical activity and physical health within secure psychiatric care, but also sort of broadening that out a bit to other areas of interest.”

2. Are there any approaches from your work in lifestyle interventions that you use to help you in your daily life too.

“When we're thinking about physical activity, we have physical activity guidelines for physical health outcomes; 150 minutes a week and that's pretty well established. But for improvements in mental health outcomes, there isn't any clear guidance there. There's been a few different commentaries on this and a few studies exploring whether we should have these guidelines and something that comes through quite a lot is that doing some is better than none. Often that 150 minutes can be quite unachievable for a lot of people. But actually, just doing a bit can be really beneficial. I think that's something that I definitely try and take forward in my own life, especially sort of around work and being very busy, that just a few minutes of getting out, going for a walk or something can be really beneficial.”

“There's also some growing evidence that looks at activities that people enjoy, and if it's something that you enjoy, it's something that you're going to keep doing. So that's definitely something that I try and think about if I want to start something new, is it something that I actually enjoy, and then, if so, I'm more likely to keep it up long term.”

Image description: Justine wears a purple rain coat whilst out on a walk in the countryside, a type of physical activity she enjoys. She is surrounded by green fields with some hills.

3. What is a myth or misconception about lifestyle interventions more broadly or in particular with your work on physical activity in secure psychiatric care settings, that should be corrected?

“Looking to both staff and patients within the secure psychiatric care setting as well as physically activity broadly and thinking about the physical activity they might like (or not) to do, there's often that view that physical activity must involve going to the gym. It must involve some kind of high intensity activity and in some cases, there's negative connotations with that, especially if they've had negative past experiences. So, we've definitely tried to reframe physical activity and shifted to more of a focus on movement and that can encapsulate a lot of different things and I think a lot of the time it's the language that we use around physical activity and exercise that can put people off.”

“When speaking to staff around their role in promoting physical activity, there's often the view that encouraging patients to be physically active must involve some kind of like sport or going to the gym, when it could be something as simple as going for a walk with a patient, and that is something that they would be able to facilitate within their role. So, I guess it's challenging misconceptions around what physical activity is and broadening that scope, especially within this intervention research when there's a lot of different barriers to physical activity, with motivation being a key one.”

4. Do you have a study or a project that you're most proud of?

“I think the project that I spoke about that I did for my Postdocs. In this project we co-produced physical activity toolkits for use within the inpatient setting, and it was my first-time using co-production as a method. I found this really valuable to use, especially in such a complex environment when you've got so many intersecting barriers. By working directly with staff and patients who would be the end users of this toolkit, we were able to develop something that was really relevant and meaningful to them and a lot of what is in that toolkit is things that we just wouldn't have come up with as part of the academic team. I think doing co-production research in that kind of setting where there's always like an inherent power imbalance, it can be quite difficult to shift that narrative for research purposes. And what we want to say is, actually, no, you're the expert and we want you to tell us what's important for you and what we should include. I've definitely reflected on how we would navigate that in future. We're really proud of what we've developed and we've had some really brilliant feedback on the toolkits.”

5. Who do you think have been some of the biggest influences on your career to date?

“Someone that has had quite a bit of influence on my thinking around physical activity and also some of my teaching around it and is Professor Panteleimon “Paddy” Ekkekakis. I went to a summer school During my PhD in 2019, which was led by him and he was talking about his theory, which is called affective-reflective theory. It's a theory that essentially provides an explanation as to why people might drop out a physical activity and it suggests that once we reach a certain physiological threshold during physical activity, that exercise can become less enjoyable, and then we're less likely to continue it in the future. It’s a theory I think about a lot, especially, when we are promoting physical activity and also adapting physical activity to various populations.”

“I'd say another big influence has been my PhD supervisor and colleague Dr Florence Kinnafick. She's definitely taught me a lot about being adaptable with research and navigating various research challenges. She's encouraged me to think very critically about the work that I'm doing andI think she's also really shown the importance of developing and maintaining strong partnerships with external partners, which is really valuable for doing impactful research and also communicating that research as well.”

5. Where do you see the field of lifestyle, lifestyle interventions research going in the next five years?

“There's definitely been a lot more research supporting the role of physical activity, for example in managing common and serious mental health conditions and I think then it may shift into some kind of policy change around that as well because the evidence is quite convincing.”

“There was also a recent commentary that I saw, questioning whether if psychiatrists don't promote physical activity, could this be considered neglect? And I thought it was interesting, thinking about whether physical activity should be considered a standard part of care.”

“I think it's definitely shifting to that to that kind of thinking. I know there's been like a growth in, like, social prescribing and maybe that will grow in relation to other lifestyle interventions and physical activity.”

At this point we were also joined by Justine’s research assistant Popcorn the cat, who you can see in the picture below.

Image description: Popcorn the black and white cat, engages in his research assistant role, by helpfully standing on the laptop keyboard!

6. What is your favourite thing about being a researcher?

“I think now I've started my role at Leicester, it's being independent in the areas that I want to explore in my research and I think that's something that you don't get in a lot of other jobs. If there's an area that I think is interesting and I want to delve a bit more into I can. I get to do things that interest me and I'm passionate about and that's definitely one of the highlights of the job.”

“I also I really enjoy supervision as well. I supervise doctoral level to undergraduate students and I really enjoy doing that and supporting them with their research. I think I also like the idea that you can, you can kind of work with anyone that you want to. So, you can kind of you can pick your colleagues even if you're at different institutions, with research, it doesn't really matter.”

7. To finish us off, what advice would you give to those who would like to do research in the area of lifestyle interventions?

“I would say thinking back to the co-production work I did, but I think this could apply to any population. It's really taking the time to understand the population that you're working with and their previous experiences with things like physical activity and the barriers that they face, and try and explore these like more broadly. I think it is really important to ensure that whatever is developed is relevant and meaningful to that population.”

“I think people are sometimes reluctant to do this because it takes a lot of time and money to be able to do this kind of work, but I do think it's really important. Physical activity is a complex behaviour and therefore we do need this kind of in-depth process before we even start any of that research to help us understand how best to approach it.”

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A big thank you to Justine for her time, and the opportunity to learn more about her fascinating work. Are you interested to learn more about Justine’s work? If so, you can in touch with Justine via:

·       Email: ja560@leicester.ac.uk

·       LinkedIn: justine anthony | LinkedIn 

If you want to read some of Justine’s recent work, below are some of her most relevant publications in this area:

·       Tweed, L., Anthony, J., Kinnafick, F.E (2025). Potentials and Pitfalls of Peer Support: Experiences and Recommendations for Peer Supported Physical Activity Programs for Mental Health Service Users. Mental Health and Physical Activity, 28, 100669. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mhpa.2024.100669

·       Anthony, J., Papathomas, A., Annandale, A., Breen, K., & Kinnafick, F. E. (2023). Experiences of physical activity for adolescents in secure psychiatric care: Staff and patient perspectives. Mental Health and Physical Activity, 24, 100506. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mhpa.2023.100506

·       Rogers, E., Anthony, J., Papthomas, A., Breen, K., & Kinnafick, F. (2025 ). The development of a theoretically informed online intervention to educate ward staff on physical activity promotion for patients in a secure psychiatric hospital. Archives of Psychiatric Nursing, 57, 151909. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apnu.2025.151909 

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Written by Dr Grace Tidmarsh