Download Health Psychology

Health
Psychology
 How our behavior makes us ill
 How to encourage us to behave in ways to keep us
healthy
 Impact of hospitals and health care system
 How to cope with stress in our lives
Health psychology in Media
 I Used to Be fat
 Biggest Loser
 Heavy
 Undergraduate:
A third of American colleges
and universities offer courses
 Graduate:
Clinical, Counseling, social, or
experimental
 APA Division 38
 Predoctoral internships
World Health Organization
Definition of Good Health

the state of complete physical, social,
and spiritual well being—not simply the
absence of illness.”
Development of Health Psychology
 New term from late 1970s (though the idea
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has been around a lot longer)
Greek scholars
Driving out demons
Germ theories
People were dying because of their lifestyles
not from regular degeneration
THE 7 HEALTH BEHAVIORS
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Breslow and Breslow (1972)
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Remain at a healthy weight for your height
Don’t smoke
Moderate or NO use of alcohol
Get regular exercise
Eat breakfast on a regular basis
Get a good night’s sleep
Do not eat between meals
 Why?
 One
key area of health psychology is the
study of what motivates us to engage in
healthy and unhealthy behavior.
Behaviorist Approach
O Classical Conditioning
O Stimulus control
O Response substitution
O Operant Conditioning
O Social Learning Theory
O http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fm
R6t7M7_5U
Cognitive Theories of Behavior
Health Belief Model
 Theory of Planned Behavior
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Trans-theoretical model
 1)precontemplation. They don’t believe they’ll make a change soon
 2) contemplation: developed some attitudes and beliefs concerning that
behavior
 3) preparation: people intend to change their behavior in the next few months
 4) action: people modify their behavior
 5) maintenance: continuing the behavior for longer than 6 months.
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 People are more likely to continue this an be successful if the have
 -reached the preparation stage
 -believe in their ability to make a change
 -change with the support of family and friends
 -are able to avoid the cues of previous unhealthy behavior
 -are able to find rewarding alternatives
 -are rewarded for maintaining the change
Stress
 Nature of Stress
 Factors in our appraisal of stress
 Responding to stress
 Emotional, physiological, behavioral
 Potential Effects of Stress
 Factors influencing stress tolerance
Frustration: thwarting of a motive
 Conflict: incompatible motives
competing
 Life changes: Good or Bad
 Pressure: expectations to Perform in a
certain way
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 Eustress=Good
Stress
 Stress is an every day event
 Lies in the eyes of the beholder
 May be embedded in the
environment
 May be self-imposed
Life Events Approach

Holmes and Rahe: Social Readjustment Rating Scale
Any noticeable alterations in one’s living circumstances
that require readjustment.
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Transactional Model: Stress is in the eye of the beholder
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Appraisal
Perception of being able to cope
Issues with Holmes and Rahe
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Correlational rather than Experimental Evidence
Positive vs. negative life changes
The need for novel stimulation
Personality differences
Cognitive appraisal
Cannon
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In 1932, coined the term “Fight or Flight” to
describe the body’s physical reaction to stress
Selye (1956) mistakenly coined the term stress
because he couldn’t find the right word in English
Rats thrown in water study (Richter’s Rats)
with/without prior stressor
Richter’s Rats
Self-Efficacy expectations
 Psychological hardiness
 Sense of Humor
 Social Support
 Optimism
 Sensation Seeking
 Autonomic reactivity
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Factors in our Appraisal of Stress
 Familiarity
 Controllability
 Predictability
 imminence
Karasek