Download Influences on health behaviour

INFLUENCES ON
HEALTH BEHAVIOUR
Week 3
Aims for this session
◦ Identify some broad influences on health behaviour
◦ Outline some models of health behaviour
Personality
◦What is personality?
Personality
◦ In general – it is what makes individuals different from one
another. We all think and behave in distinctive ways
demonstrating traits or qualities that are persistent regardless of
the situation.
◦ McCrae and Costa (1987, 1990) proposed a five factor model
which identifies five primary factors of personality:
◦ Neuroticism
◦ Extroversion
◦ Openness (to experience)
◦ Agreeableness
◦ Conscientiousness
Personality
◦ Visit the following website and take the ‘Big five’ personality test.
◦ http://www.outofservice.com/bigfive/
◦ Studies have shown that relatively stable personality factors are
associated with health behaviour.
◦ Example – association between personality and dietary
behaviour, traits such as openness have been associated with
healthy eating due to willingness to try new situations such as
new food tastes and types.
◦ What do you think?
Health Locus of Control
◦ Another commonly investigated aspect of personality is an
individual’s locus of control.
◦ In general people are considered to have either an internal or
external orientation.
◦ Internal locus of control – personal responsibility for actions and
outcomes
◦ External locus of control – responsibility is due to external factors
such as ‘luck’
Health Locus of Control
◦ Kenneth Wallston – developed a locus of control scale specific to
health beliefs.
◦ Internal – strong internal beliefs, the individual is the prime
determinant of their health, associated with high levels of health
protective behaviour and with a concept known as self-efficacy
(the belief that one can perform particular behaviour in a given
set of circumstances)
Health Locus of Control
◦ External – strong beliefs that external forces such as luck or
chance determine an individual’s health state rather than the
behaviour of the individual.
◦ Powerful others – strong beliefs that consider health to be
determined by the actions of powerful others such as health and
medical professionals.
◦ What do you think? Where do your beliefs fit on the scale?
Social Norms, Family and Friends
◦ Our behaviour is a result of many influences:
◦ Culture, groups and sub-groups and individuals with whom we
interact. Our own personal emotions, values and attitudes.
◦ We learn from our own experience but also from observation of
other people’s experiences and behaviour.
◦ Think about how people make the decision to start smoking
cigarettes - how much is this decision affected by peers, family,
advertising, perceptions about the health risks, e.g. having
apparently healthy friends and family who are smokers, having a
positive identification (or not) with the person who first offers you
a cigarette.
Attitudes
◦ Defined as ‘common sense representations that individuals hold in
relation to people, objects and events’ (Eagly and Chaiken, 1993)
◦ In other words – you either like something / someone or you do not.
◦ From the 1960s onwards – attitudes considered to be made up of three
related parts:
◦ Cognitive (thought) – beliefs about the attitude-object, e.g. smoking
cigarettes is a good way to relieve stress; smoking cigarettes is a sign of
weakness.
◦ Emotional – feelings towards the attitude-object, e.g. smoking
cigarettes is disgusting / pleasurable.
◦ Behavioural (intentional) – the intended action towards the attitudeobject, e.g. I am not going to smoke.
Attitudes
◦ Not as simple as we might think – we can hold conflicting
attitudes about a particular attitude-object, e.g. enjoying the
taste of chocolate, cream cakes, fast food etc. whilst also being
worried about the negative health implications of a high
fat/salt/calorie intake.
◦ These contradictory thoughts are known as dissonance.
◦ Many people will try and bring their thoughts into line with one
another but some will not, e.g. continuing to smoke, overeat etc.
despite holding negative attitudes about the behaviour.
◦ This is referred to as ambivalence – an important concept as a
person’s motivation to change unhealthy behaviour could be
undermined by the ambivalent attitude.
Risk Perceptions and Unrealistic
Optimism
◦ People may engage in risky behaviour because they do not think
themselves to be at risk, or do not accurately think they are at risk, e.g.
‘I don’t smoke as much as her/him so I won’t be at risk of cancer.’
◦ Unrealistic optimism – associated with several factors:
◦ Lack of personal experience with the behaviour or problem concerned
◦ Belief that individual actions can prevent problems
◦ Belief that if the problem has not already emerged it is unlikely to do so
in the future
◦ Belief that the problem is rare
Goals and Motivation
◦ Social cognition theory argues that behaviour is motivated by
outcome expectancies and goals (long and short term) and
related to the process of self-regulation.
◦ Outcome expectancies – the outcome that is expected to result
from a behaviour, e.g. regular exercise will make me fitter
◦ Self regulation – the way in which individuals act to monitor and
adjust their behaviour, thoughts and emotions to maintain a
sense of balance, and, bring about desired outcomes(goals) or
reduce undesired outcomes (goals).
Goals and Motivation
◦ However, people may have a variety of reasons for behaving the
way they do;
◦ Smoking – may want to give up in long term but is a coping
mechanism re: stress at present.
◦ Exercise – may be seen as preventive in terms of illness but also as
means of relaxation or time out activity.
◦ Implication - any intervention designed to reduce ‘unhealthy’
behaviour needs to take coping goals into account.
Self -Efficacy
◦ Believing that a future action, e.g. weight loss, is within one’s
capabilities, can lead to other cognitive and emotional activities,
such as setting high goals, having positive outcome
expectancies and reduced anxiety.
◦ Research the theory of Albert Bandura re: self-efficacy.
References
◦ On slides
◦ Also:
◦ Morrison, V. and Bennet, P. (2006) An Introduction to Health Psychology, Essex: Pearson
Education Limited