10 - Health Related Behaviours Flashcards
What are health related behaviours?
Health-related behaviours are anything that may promote good health or lead to illness e.g. smoking, drinking, drug use, exercise, healthy diet, safe sex
Why are health-related behaviours important?
- At least 1/3 of all disease burden in the developed world is caused by tobacco, alcohol, BP, obesity and cholesterol
- Behaviour risk factors are responsible for 80% of CHD and cerebrovascular disease
What are 7 factors that promote longevity of life?
- Sleep 7-8 hours a night
- Dont smoke
- Eat breakfast
- Near ideal weight
- Don’t eat between meals
- Regular exercise
- Drink alcohol in moderation or not at all
What is classical conditioning?
- Learning theory that helps you to understand peoples health related behaviours
- Behaviours can be linked to unrelated stimuli e.g environmental and emotional cues
What are techniques to overcome classical conditioning?
- Pair behaviour with an unpleasant response e.g disulfiram
- Break unconscious response e.g elastic band on fags
- Avoid environment with the cues
What are the limitations of the conditioning theories (classical and operant) ?
No account of social context, cognitive processes, knowledge, beliefs, memory, attitudes, expectations etc.
What is operant conditioning?
Learning theory where behaviour is shaped by consequences
- Behaviour continues if rewarded or punishment removed
- Behaviour decreaseds if reward removed or punished
What are the limitations of operant conditioning?
- Unhealthy behaviours are immediately rewarding, e.g unsafe sex
- Driven by short term rewards
How can you overcome the operant conditioning?
Shape behaviour through reinforcement, e.g instead of buying fags save the money for a holiday
What is the social learning theory?
People learn through vicariously. Learn what behaviours are rewarded, and what we are capable of doing through observing others.
People will perform behaviour that is valued and what people believe they can enact (self-efficacy)
What are positives and negatives of the social learning theory?
What is a social cognition model?
They do not just look at unconscious learning but also the conscious learning
What is the cognitive dissonance theory?
A social cognition model where people feel discomfort when their beliefs don’t match actions/events
People reduce discomfort by changing their beliefs and behaviours, this can be used in health campaigns
What is the health belief model?
A social cognition model explaining the likelihood of engaging in health promoting behaviour
What are the limitations of social cognition models?
- Assume cognitive behaviour is based on pros and cons but could be habits
- Doesn’t incorporate emotional influences
- Reasoning often only happens after the risky behaviour
What is the theory of planned behaviour?
Social cognition theory that links beliefs and behaviours
What are the limitations to the theory of planned behaviour?
- Good predictor of intentions but poor predictor of behaviour
- Problem with translating intentions into behaviour
What do you have to do in an integrative model for targeted intervention?
- Specifiy behaviour to be changed
- Understand nature of the behaviour and what influences it
- Choose behaviour change technique matched to diagnosis
Why don’t people participate in good health behaviour?
- Lack of capability (knowledge and skills)
- Insufficient opportunity
- Motivation to do bad things stronger than to engage in health behaviour as healthy is more difficult
What is the COM-B model?
Then you can match the intervention to the diagnosis by addressing barriers to change. Behaviour occurs as a result of three necessary conditions
What is the behaviour change wheel?
Can use the COM-B model to choose and intervention most appropriate
What is the cycle of change?
Stages people go though when making a change, peoples health behaviours and beliefs can change over time they are not static
