Healthy Living - Health Belief Studies and Theories

Question 1

Which theory was behind Becker’s study and what does it mean?

Answer 1

The Health Belief Model. It is used to predict whether an individual will engage in a healthy behaviour. This is according to 6 factors: perceived threat, perceived susceptibility, perceived seriousness, whether the benefits outweigh the costs, internal and external cues and demographic variables such as age, gender and marital status.

Question 2

What was the background to the health belief model?

Answer 2

In 1954, many people decided not to go to free Tuberculosis screenings. The health belief model was therefore introduced by Rosenstock and Becker in 1966, to try and find out or explain why people didn’t use the free tuberculosis screenings.

Question 3

What was the aim of Becker et al’s study on compliance of medical regimes with asthma?

Answer 3

To use the health belief model to explain mother’s adherence to a drug regime for their asthmatic children.

Question 4

Describe the participants used in Becker et al’s study.

Answer 4

Becker interviewed 111 mothers aged between 17 and 54 years about their asthmatic children, who were aged 9 months to 17 years.

Question 5

What was the procedure for Becker’s study?

Answer 5

Each mother was interviewed and asked questions about their perceptions of:

• Their child’s susceptibility to illness and asthma
• Their beliefs about how serious asthma is
• How much their child’s asthma interfered with their child’s education, caused embarrassment and interfered with the mother’s activities.
• Their doctor’s effectiveness
• The effectiveness of the medication used.

Question 6

What method was used in Becker’s study?

Answer 6

Self report/correlation/clinical tests. 70% of participants used a covert blood test to measure the actual level of medication in their system.

Question 7

Describe the results for Becker’s study

Answer 7

Positive correlation between:

• mother’s belief about her child’s susceptibility to asthma and compliance to the medical regime.
• severity of child’s asthma and compliance.
• compliance and married mothers.
• education of mothers and compliance.

Negative correlation between:

• disruption of daily routines and compliance
• inaccessibility of chemists and compliance
• child complaints about the medication and compliance.

Question 8

What was concluded from Becker’s study?

Answer 8

The HBM is a useful model to predict and explain different levels of compliance with medical regimes.

Question 9

What are 3 strengths of Becker’s study on compliance to a medical regime?

Answer 9

+ Good sample size - ok external reliability.

+ Concurrent validity - correlation, self report and blood tests all used.

+ Correlation - good basis for further experimental research.

Question 10

What are 3 limitations of Becker’s study on compliance to medical regimes?

Answer 10

• Self report (interviews) used, which decrease validity and PPS may be subject to social desirability bias.
• Gynocentric sample - only the mothers of the asthmatic children were asked questions, not the fathers. This decreases the generalisability of the findings.
• Correlation used - so difficult to establish cause and effect relationships between variables.

Question 11

What are 3 strengths of the health belief model?

Answer 11

+ Holistic, as 6 different variables are considered to predict compliance.

+ Can be applied and used to predict the behaviour of most people - not limited to certain types of people.

+ Useful, as interventions can take place once it’s known which patients are less likely to engage in healthy behaviour than others.

Question 12

What are 3 limitations of the health belief model?

Answer 12

• Not a very scientific method - interviews etc may be affected by interviewer bias/subconscious cues, etc.
• Only predicts the likelihood of a healthy behaviour - so is it really useful?
• Not all health behaviour arise as a result of a conscious thought process (e.g brushing teeth is habit) so the HBM cannot be applied to all health behaviours - limited usefulness and validity.

Question 13

Which theory was behind Rotter’s study?

Answer 13

The Locus of Control theory.

Question 14

What was the aim of Rotter’s study?

Answer 14

To investigate the Locus of Control theory.

Question 15

What is the Locus of Control theory?

Answer 15

The theory, applied to health behaviours, measures the extent to which an individual believes they can influence their health.

Question 16

Name and describe the 3 dimensions of the health locus of control.

Answer 16

1. Internality - the extent to which an individual perceives internal control over their health.
2. Chance - The belief that chance or fate can influence health or ill health. (external factors)
3. Powerful Others - The belief in the control of health professionals in maintaining a healthy lifestyle.

Question 17

Which method was used in Rotter’s study on Locus of Control?

Answer 17

Review Article

Question 18

What was the sample in Rotter’s study on the Locus of Control theory?

Answer 18

6 pieces of research into individual perceptions of ability to control outcomes based on reinforcement.

Question 19

What were the results of Rotter’s study on the Locus of Control theory?

Answer 19

Results from the studies consistently showed that participants who felt they had control over the situation were more likely to behave in a way that would let them cope with potential threats, than those who thought that chance or other external, uncontrollable forces, determined the effects of their behaviours.

Question 20

What were the conclusions made from Rotter’s study on the Locus of Control theory?

Answer 20

• The locus of control would affect many of our behaviours, not just health behaviours.
• From a study by James et al (1965), male smokers who gave up smoking and did not relapse were found to have more of an internal locus of control than those who did not quit.
• There was no significant difference in the loci of control for women who gave up smoking compared to those who didn’t, indicating that factors such as weight gain were influential in giving up smoking.

Question 21

What are 3 strengths of the Locus of control theory?

Answer 21

+ High face validity - actually measures an individual’s locus of control.

+ Reductionist, which is good as it can isolate the locus of control.

+ Effective (3-point) scale, which means the theory has good validity.

Question 22

What are 3 weaknesses of the locus of control theory?

Answer 22

• Unreliable, as a person’s locus of control changes at different times in their life and for different health problems/parts of the mind or body.
• Low ecological validity, as the LoC can ony be measured through self reports/answering questions.
• Low validity in general, as the answers participants give can be affected by social desirability bias.

Question 23

What are 3 strengths of Rotter’s study?

Answer 23

+ High concurrent validity, as 6 studies’ results were all in agreement/came to the same conclusions.

+ Holistic, as 6 different studies were read and considered before making conclusions.

+ Useful - we can improve people’s locus of control to increase their likelihood of engaging in healthy behaviours

Question 24

What are 3 weaknesses of Rotter’s study?

Answer 24

• Low validity, as information about the samples from the studies that were reviewed is not included in this study.
• Low reliability, as this study is second hand research and therefore misinterpretation of the first hand research may have occurred.
• The participants in the studies may not necessarily have been in health “situations” or had to take part in health related tasks. This means the study lacks mundane realism, ecological validity and face validity.

Question 25

Which theory was behind Bandura’s study on Health Belief?

Answer 25

Self efficacy

Question 26

What is self efficacy?

Answer 26

It is the belief of an individual in their ability to change their health behaviour.

‘We work harder if we think we can succeed and working harder means we are more likely we can succeed.’

Question 27

What affects Self Efficacy?

Answer 27

• Enactive Influences
• Vicarious Influences
• Persuasory Influences
• Emotive Influences

Question 28

What are enactive influences?

Answer 28

The extent of your past success.

Question 29

What are vicarious influences?

Answer 29

Comparing yourself with the success of others.

Question 30

What are persuasory influences?

Answer 30

The positive feedback that other people (friends, family, doctors) give you.

Question 31

What are emotive influences?

Answer 31

Feelings like anxiety may lead an individual to feel incapable of completing a specific task.

Question 32

What was the aim of Bandura’s study on self efficacy?

Answer 32

To assess the self efficacy of patients engaging in systematic desensitisation for snake phobias.

Question 33

What was the method of Bandura’s study on self efficacy?

Answer 33

Quasi Experiment.

Question 34

What was the sample in Bandura’s study on self efficacy?

Answer 34

• 10 patients with ophidophobia who replied to an advert.
• 9 females, 1 male.
• Aged 19-57.

Question 35

What was the procedure of Bandura’s study on self efficacy?

Answer 35

Level of fear measured + PPS’ perception of how well they could cope.

• PPS given relaxation exercises.
• PPS were desensitised to snakes: first shown pictures under controlled conditions, then put in the same room as snakes once arousal levels had fallen, then PPS handled snakes once arousal levels had fallen again.
• Fear levels and coping perceptions measured again.

Question 36

What were the results of Bandura’s study on self efficacy?

Answer 36

Fear scores at end of the experiment were significantly lower than at the start and coping perceptions were significantly higher.

Question 37

What conclusions were made from Bandura’s study?

Answer 37

• Desensitisation works.
• Desensitisation is effective because of classical conditioning - associating the snakes/presence of the snakes with nothing (negative) occurring.
• Study supports concept of self-efficacy because the activities led to a change in perception of snakes.
• Self efficacy is a cognitive and behavioural concept. Cognitive: Perception of the snakes influences behaviour.
  Behavioural: Perception is learned from past experience.
  (enactive influences)

Question 38

What are 3 strengths of the self efficacy theory?

Answer 38

+ Relatively holistic, as there are 4 variables/factors that influence self efficacy.

+ Useful - treatment plans such as systematic desensitisation have developed from it.

+ Generalisable - can be used for a wide range of scenarios and situations.

Question 39

What are 3 weaknesses of the self efficacy theory?

Answer 39

• Reductionist, as it assumes that only self efficacy affects an individual’s health behaviour.
• An individual’s self efficacy can change over time, which decreases the validity of the measurement of self efficacy, as it is only normally measured once.
• Self reports are used to gauge the self efficacy of an individual and are often low in validity as responses are subject to social desirability bias.

Question 40

What are 3 strengths of Bandura’s self efficacy study?

Answer 40

+ Highly ethical. Not only have the participants given full consent, as they have replied to an advert to take part in the study, but the study also removes the phobias that patients have.

+ Controlled conditions enable cause and effect relationships to be established. Also means the study can be easily repeated.

+ Useful - widely applied to other disorders such as anxiety.

Question 41

What are 3 weaknesses of Bandura’s self efficacy study?

Answer 41

• Lab experiment - low ecological validity - can systematic desensitisation work in the same way in the workplace/outside a laboratory? (NO!)
• Demand characteristics, as fear and coping perception scores were asked for twice. Reduced validity.
• Sample is highly gynocentric - 90% female. Therefore generalisability is significantly reduced. It is also very small, reducing external reliability.