What to do? Flashcards
What is science?
-Evidence based knowledge and practice gained from rigorous research
What is scienciness?
-Opinions about science based on some fact but extrapolated beyond available evidence and supported mostly by belief rather than data
Problems with health behaviour change?
- Why should I do it? (outcome expectation)
- I don’t want to/I don’t like it (affective attitudes)
- How bad is my behaviour anyways? (Attitudes towards own behaviour)
- How hard will the change be? (Costs)
- Can I do it? (self-efficacy)
- Who will help me? (social support)
- I want to, but can’t get going (Implementation intention gap)
Motivation is not always enough. So we need to target and be precise with…
- Be precise about target behaviour because meanings can be different for different people
- Be precise about target audience because groups differ in knowledge, cognitions, motivation, skills, and understanding
What are effect sizes?
-How much of the behaviour can we explain because of a particular intervention?
What approach leads to bigger effect size?
- Behavioural approaches have bigger effects than informational approaches
- Reward and punishment have bigger effects than just giving information (information and knowledge is necessary but not sufficient)
What is the risk reduction approach?
- Focusing only on the individual to move into normal level of risk
- Can be labor intensive, expensive, and hard
What is the population level intervention approach?
- Encouraging EVERYONE in a population to change their behaviour
- Moving an entire population into lower or less risk
- Can use taxation or restrictions on negative health behaviours
- Can get a bigger effect size by moving an entire population into lower level risk
Acquiring new behaviours is a process, not an event. What are the implications?
- entails learning by performing successive approximations of the behaviour
- Emphasize gradual change because too much too soon is harder
- Expect individual differences in readiness to change because some are in thinking process and some are ready
- Develop program elements specific to each step in the behaviour change process (motivational and volitional phases)
What is the motivational phase?
- Someone starting to think about change
- Trying to move them forward to set a goal
What is the volitional phase?
-They are ready and have made a goal but what do they need to get the motivation to make the change?
The more beneficial or rewarding an experience, the more likely it is to be repeated; more punishing and unpleasant, the less likely it is to be repeated. What are the implications?
- Make things positive for people
- Think about what is immediately reinforcing or punishing about a behaviour
- Program components that cause people to experience personal control, success or social recognition (to reinforce)
- Teach individuals to be self-reinforcing (goal-setting, self-talk, creating own experiences)
- Make sure fear components can be resolved
- Even if you are trying to get someone to stop a poor health behaviour, make the alternative behaviour positive
Individuals are not passive responders, but have a proactive role int he behaviour change process. What are the implications?
- Engage people as much as you can
- Involve members of the target audience in developing messages, programs, and interventions
- Use a bottom up approach instead of top down
What is a top down approach?
- Someone thinks they are an expert and tells someone what to do
- Does not work well
What is a bottom up approach?
- Talking to people, collaboration and working with them
- More effective because people feel invested
