It’s an ongoing debate whether investing in home fitness equipment is a smart idea…I know that as a fitness trainer, I used to hate it when people said they will just buy a treadmill versus joining a gym. I don’t think they realize how important the ENVIRONMENT is when you exercise.

For me, and for most, when you are at a gym, you are around a ton of people who are on the same GOAL as you…to lose weight, gain muscle and stay active.

You have a variety of different fitness equipment so that you won’t get bored…and you can make friends and take group exercise classes.

This does NOT mean I don’t promote buying at home fitness supplies.

I actually have a treadmill, a bike, a stability ball, a weight set, bands and tons of DVD’s. The only difference between me and the regular person is: I ACTUALLY use it!

So…whether or not you will use a treadmill when you buy it is a toss up. To help gauge where you stand, check out this new study:

How Often Will You Use That Treadmill?

ScienceDaily (Nov. 19, 2008) — Why not buy that treadmill? You’ll be exercising every day, right? A new study in the Journal of Consumer Research examines why our expectations of our behavior so often don’t match reality.

Authors Robin J. Tanner (University of Wisconsin-Madison) and Kurt A. Carlson (Duke University) uncovered a specific process that they believe contributes to unrealistic optimism. They also suggest a method to encourage consumers to think more realistically about their future actions.

“Consumers adopt the tentative hypothesis that they will behave in an ideal fashion when predicting their future behavior,” the authors explain. “Unrealistic optimism by consumers may have negative consequences for both marketers and consumers. For example, if a consumer holds unrealistically optimistic beliefs about how often they will work out in the future, then they may overpay for home exercise equipment.” Read the rest here.

Is purchasing a treadmill a joke?