All Flashcards
Define health psychology
Scientific study of human mind and its functions, as well as processes in health, illness and health care. It is an interdisciplinary field application of psychological knowledge and techniques to health, illness and health care
Define healthy
Physically and mentally in balance. Content with who you are physically, emotionally and spiritually.
What are the stages in the Biomedical Model of Health?
Normal state + disease/trauma > disabled state > intervention > normal state
What is the Biopsychosocial Model of Health?
Incorporating social, biomedical and psychological factors when determining health
Name two reasons for applying models
~ To theoretically understand the considered area
~ To plan interventions
Explain the Health Belief Model.
The likelihood of engaging in a behaviour is dependent on:
~ Age, sex, ethnicity etc.
~ Perceived susceptibility and severity.
~ Perceived threat (dependent on cues to action)
~ Perceived benefits minus perceived barriers
Which all in turn is dependent on self-efficacy
Define psychology
The scientific study of the human mind and its functions (especially behaviour related)
What is the Protection Motivation Theory?
It describes adaptive and maladaptive coping due to a health threat as a result of:
~ Threat appraisal (intrinsic/extrinsic rewards - severity, vulnerability and fear)
~ Coping appraisal (response/self-efficacy)
Describe the Theory of Reasoned Action
The belief that a person’s intention to perform a health behaviour is shaped by personal beliefs and social influences
What is the Theory of Planned Behaviour?
An extension to the Theory of Reasoned Action, including controlled beliefs, power and perceived control
What are the stages in the Stages of Change Model?
Pre-contemplation > contemplation > determination/preparation > action > maintenance > relapse/recycle
What is the Health Action Process Approach (HAPA)?
An attempt to fill the “intention-behaviour gap”, highlighting the role of self-efficacy and action plans
What is required to change health related behaviours?
Motivation and volition. Self-regulation also plays a critical role
Define eustress
Adjustment from positive events
Define distress
Adjustment from negative events
What does stress as a stimulus do?
Make a person aroused. It requires adapting/adjusting
What is stress as a response?
A reaction to stress. Can be physical (sweating, increase pulse etc) or psychological (emotions, behaviours and thoughts).
What does stress increase the likelihood of?
Unhealthy behaviour patterns.
Name two types of moderators of stress.
~ Intrapersonal (behavioural, cognitive, decisional, informational and personal control)
~ Extrapersonal (environment, people, dogs, material things and social support)
What are the two aspects of the Locus of Control?
~ External - control of events is outside individual’s influence
~ Internal - individual has control of events
What are the three C’s of hardiness?
~ Commitment (important to stay, withdrawal is a waste of time)
~ Control (passivity is bad. Always wanting to influence outcomes)
~ Challenge (stress is a natural part of life and an opportunity to grow)
What is a biotype?
A personality type specifically associated with an illness or a disease (eg alcoholic)
Define a disease-prone personality.
They have a predisposition to become ill due to ineffective coping styles
What are four social support types?
~ Emotional (empathy, care, trust)
~ Esteem/appraisal (transmission of relevant information for self-evaluation)
~ Informational (knowledge and information relevant to managing a stressor)
~ Instrumental/tangible (material and practical assistance)
What is motivational interviewing?
Non-confrontational. For people reluctant to change
What does CBT do?
Asses thoughts, emotions and behaviours at once.
What is operant conditioning?
A type of behaviour modification through reinforcement (both positive and negative). Leads to extinction of behaviour by not reinforcing it.
What is classical conditioning?
A progressive hierarchy of feared objects.
- Exposure is imagined
- In vivo
- Virtual reality
What is cognitive therapy based on?
That thoughts are central to regulation of behaviour. It intends to teach the individual that beliefs are hypothesis and not facts
How are thoughts structured?
They are automatic and distorted. It is important to be aware of this and challenge one’s own thoughts.
Cognitive distortions: define All or nothing
Viewing the situation in black and white terms.
Cognitive distortions: define selective abstraction
Focusing on negative details rather than the whole picture
Cognitive distortions: define overgeneralisation
Making sweeping negative conclusion, beyond the situation setting.
Cognitive distortions: define fortune telling
Predicting the future or recent past negatively. Catastrophising without basis
Cognitive distortions: define magnifying/minimising
Making a situation worse in your mind and underestimating your own strengths
Cognitive distortions: define labelling
Putting a fixed, overgeneralised label on oneself and others based on a few behaviours.
Cognitive distortions: define emotional reasoning
Thinking something is true because one believes in it strongly
Cognitive distortions: define mind reading
Belief to know others’ thoughts and views of a situation
Cognitive distortions: define personalisation
The belief that others’ behaviour is based on what oneself has done
Cognitive distortions: define should’s and shouldn’ts
Precise and fixed notion of how one self and others should(‘ve) behave(d)
Name six social determinants of health
~ Education ~ Employment ~ Gender ~ Cultural background ~ Support networks ~ The social, economic and political climate of the country
What factors does a holistic approach to development involve?
~ Physical
~ Social
~ Emotional
~ Cognitive
Erickson’s psychosocial stages: explain the stages in infancy and childhood and health issues
- (0-1 year) - trust/mistrust
- (1-3 years) - autonomy/shame and doubt
- (3-5 years) - initiative/guilt
- (6-12 years) - industry/inferiority
Health issues: immunisation, screening, instill good lifestyle patterns, attachment relationships
Erickson’s psychosocial stages: explain what happens in adolescence
Move from concrete to formal operations. More abstract thinking, which leads to greater understanding of health promotion messages. Risk taking is more common (hormones, peer pressure, invincibility?)
Health issues: body image, sexual health and mental health. 18-23 year olds have the highest prevalence of mental illnesses.
Erickson’s psychosocial stages: what happens in adulthood?
29-34 years - crisis of questions (what is the meaning of life?)
35-43 years - crisis of urgency (career success, meet life goals)
43-50 years - attaining stability (calmer acceptance of fate)
50+ years - mellowing
Partnered men are happier while partnered women have the highest depression rates. Men suffer more severely from breakups, while single women have lowest depression rates
What are the two theories of successful ageing?
Disengagement (normal/desirable to withdraw from society)
Activity (essence of life. Remain physically, mentally and socially active)
Define clinical pain
Requires medical treatment and is the most common reason for seeking it
Define general pain
Involves total experience. Is influence by biological, psychological and sociobehavioural forces
Define pain
Sensory, emotional and cognitive experiences from actual or perceived tissue damage or irritation
Define acute pain
Sharp, stinging and short lived. Subsides within 3 months and responds to analgesics and treatment
Define acute recurrent pain
Episodes of discomfort between pain free periods. Alerts us when something is wrong (ie migraine)
Define pre-chronic pain
Acute pain that persists. Time is critical. May lead to a sense of helplessness.
Define chronic pain
Continuous or intermittent, moderate or severe. Lasts longer than 3 months and may lead to depression or anxiety
Define hyperalgesia
Becoming more sensitive to pain over time
Define congenital analgesia
Inability to feel pain. Is dangerous, especially in children
Define neuralgia
Sharp pain along nerve pathway. Not due to injury
Define causalgia
Burning pain following severe wound. Not due to injury
Define phantom limb pain
False pain in missing limb. It’s cause is unknown but happens to 64-85% of amputees
What is a nociceptor?
A nerve cell ending that initiates the sense of pain
What are fast nerve A fibres?
Large and myelinated. They transmit fast, stinging pain
What are slow nerve C fibres?
Small and unmyelinated. Carry dull and aching pain
What happens in the somato sensory cortex?
Acute pain is projected here by A fibres
What happens in the thalamus?
Chronic pain is projected here by C fibres
Explain the Gate Control Theory
It is a neural gate in the substantia gelatinosa (where A and C fibres synapse and regulate experience of pain). C fibres “open” the gate to the brain, while A fibres “close” it. The brain can also close the gate (anxiety, fear, distraction)
What is the pain perception threshold?
The point when a stimulus becomes painful. Varies little between individuals
What is the severe pain threshold?
Point when pain becomes unbearable. Depends on psychosocial factors
Name some pharmacological treatments for pain.
Mainly analgesics. Opioids (eg morphine), non-opioid (eg aspirins), surgery and counter-irritation (stimulate another part of the body)
How is CBT used for pain?
Extensively. It challenges catastrophising and overgeneralising. Sets goals and increases self-efficacy.
What are the five stages of Kübler-Ross’s Theory?
- Denial
- Anger
- Bargaining
- Depression
- Acceptance
What are the three steps of the grief process?
- Avoidance/disbelief (too much to comprehend)
- Confrontation (how could it have been avoided?)
- Restoration (reorganising life tasks)
Define health behaviour
A behaviour engaged in by healthy individuals to prevent illness and disease development
Define illness behaviour
A behaviour engaged in by ill individuals to identify illness and asses recovery strategies
Define sick role behaviour and the rights and responsibilities that accompany it
Response to being diagnosed with a disease or health condition.
Rights: exception from social duties and attribution of responsibility for acquiring illness.
Responsibilities: try to get well and seek + cooperate with medical help
What do fear arousal campaigns do?
Scare people into buying items or engaging in/avoiding a behaviour. Eg pictures on cigarette packages
What is the core of Bandura’s Social Learning Theory?
People learn from one another via observation, imitation and modelling
What is the Social Model of Health?
Health is influenced by age, sex and constitutional factors, which in turn is affected by individual lifestyle factors, social and community networks, living and working conditions and general socio-economic, cultural and environmental conditions.
What are some aspects of indigenous health?
Indigenous people are generally less healthy, die younger, have more diseases, lower Quality of Life (QoL), lower incomes, higher unemployment rates and are less educated.
What are some health aspects for rural Australians?
They have a lower economic advantage, more occupational risks, greater levels of smoking etc.
Factors that affect recognition and interpretation of symptoms: define attentional focus
Characteristic style of monitoring bodily symptoms. A strong internal focus makes it more likely to detect symptoms
Factors that affect recognition and interpretation of symptoms: define sensitisers/monitors
Coping with health problems by scanning body and environment for information. It is, however, not necessarily accurate
Factors that affect recognition and interpretation of symptoms: define repressors/blunters
Coping by distancing one self from stressful information (ie avoid screening)
Factors that affect recognition and interpretation of symptoms: what is the effect of one’s outlook on life?
People with a positive outlook on life will report fewer symptoms.
Factors that affect recognition and interpretation of symptoms: define schemas and name its five types
Things that influence one’s reaction to symptoms.
- Identify (label and symptoms. If certain symptoms are present, one may look for others)
- Causes (are they external or internal?)
- Timeline (is it acute or chronic?)
- Consequences (physical, social and economic. Ignore symptoms with less effect)
- Controllability (if it seems incurable the patient is more likely to miss appointments etc)
Factors that affect recognition and interpretation of symptoms: define mood
Influences perception. Anxiety and depression can lead to excessive focus on symptoms
Factors that affect recognition and interpretation of symptoms: name a few aspects of socio-cultural factors
Prior experience and expectations.
Exaggerate expected symptoms or ignore unexpected symptoms.
Socio-economic status (higher status > fewer symptoms reported).
Gender and age (women are more likely to use health services.
Delay in seeking treatment: meaning of appraisal factor?
Symptoms are not yet noticed
Delay in seeking treatment: meaning of illness factor?
Sickness seems unlikely due to previous experience
Delay in seeking treatment: meaning of behavioural factor?
Professional help seems unnecessary
Delay in seeking treatment: meaning of scheduling factor?
Procrastinates in making appointment
Delay in seeking treatment: meaning of treatment factor?i
Perceived benefits do not outweigh costs
Define non-adherence
Individuals do not comply to or follow with treatment advice. Can be partial or complete
Name a few reasons for non-adherence
- Forgetting
- Side effects of treatment
- Alternative methods are considered better
- Feeling better/worse
- Education
- Lifestyle
Name a few factors that impact on the doctor-patient relationship
- Doctor’s level of job satisfaction, communication style, patient’s satisfaction with doctor
- Clinicians may find difficulties in conveying information about present serious illness (especially if it is related to sexual functions)
- Jargon, use of closed questions or a hurried interview
What are the four psychological determinants of health?
Personality, learning, affect, cognition
The primary goals of psychological interventions in medical patients are to:
Reduce distress, improve disease management and reduce risk of future disease or disease progression
What does the attribution model identify?
A person’s views as to the cause of their illness
What are the two theories which may explain the benefits of social support?
Direct effects hypothesis and buffering hypothesis
When may avoidant coping be beneficial to Quality of Life (QoL)?
In situations where the person cannot exert control
