Understanding behavioral and contextual factors

Neuroscience & Psychology

Health psychologists conduct research to identify behaviors and experiences that promote health, give rise to illness, and influence the effectiveness of health care. They also recommend ways to improve health care policy. Health psychologists have worked on developing ways to reduce smoking and improve daily nutrition in order to promote health and prevent illness. They have also studied the association between illness and individual characteristics. For example, health psychology has found a relation between the personality characteristics of thrill seeking, impulsiveness, hostility/anger, emotional instability, and depression, on one hand, and high-risk driving, on the other.

 

Health psychology is also concerned with contextual factors, including economic, cultural, community, social, and lifestyle factors that influence health. Physical addiction impedes smoking cessation. Some research suggests that seductive advertising also contributes to psychological dependency on tobacco, although other research has found no relationship between media exposure and smoking in youth. OHP research indicates that people in jobs that combine little decision latitude with a high psychological workload are at increased risk for cardiovascular disease. Other research reveals a relation between unemployment and elevations in blood pressure. Epidemiologic research documents a relation between social class and cardiovascular disease.

Health psychologists also aim to change health behaviors for the dual purpose of helping people stay healthy and helping patients adhere to disease treatment regimens (also see health action process approach). Health psychologists employ cognitive behavioral therapy and applied behavior analysis (also see behavior modification) for that purpose.

Preventing illness

Health psychologists promote health through behavioral change, as mentioned above; however, they attempt to prevent illness in other ways as well. Health psychologists try to help people to lead a healthy life by developing and running programmes which can help people to make changes in their lives such as stopping smoking, reducing the amount of alcohol they consume, eating more healthily, and exercising regularly. Campaigns informed by health psychology have targeted tobacco use. Those least able to afford tobacco products consume them most. Tobacco provides individuals with a way of controlling aversive emotional states accompanying daily experiences of stress that characterize the lives of deprived and vulnerable individuals. Practitioners emphasize education and effective communication as a part of illness prevention because many people do not recognize, or minimize, the risk of illness present in their lives. Moreover, many individuals are often unable to apply their knowledge of health practices owing to everyday pressures and stresses. A common example of population-based attempts to motivate the smoking public to reduce its dependence on cigarettes is anti-smoking campaigns.

 

Health psychologists help to promote health and well-being by preventing illness. Some illnesses can be more effectively treated if caught early. Health psychologists have worked to understand why some people do not seek early screenings or immunizations, and have used that knowledge to develop ways to encourage people to have early health checks for illnesses such as cancer and heart disease. Health psychologists are also finding ways to help people to avoid risky behaviors (e.g., engaging in unprotected sex) and encourage health-enhancing behaviors (e.g., regular tooth brushing or hand washing).

 

Health psychologists also aim at educating health professionals, including physicians and nurses, in communicating effectively with patients in ways that overcome barriers to understanding, remembering, and implementing effective strategies for reducing exposures to risk factors and making health-enhancing behavior changes.

 

There is also evidence from OHP that stress-reduction interventions at the workplace can be effective. For example, Kompier and his colleagues have shown that a number of interventions aimed at reducing stress in bus drivers has had beneficial effects for employees and bus companies.

 

The effects of disease

Health psychologists investigate how disease affects individuals' psychological well-being. An individual who becomes seriously ill or injured faces many different practical stressors. These stressors include problems meeting medical and other bills, problems obtaining proper care when home from the hospital, obstacles to caring for dependents, the experience of having one's sense of self-reliance compromised, gaining a new, unwanted identity as that of a sick person, and so on. These stressors can lead to depression, reduced self-esteem, etc.

 

Health psychology also concerns itself with bettering the lives of individuals with terminal illness. When there is little hope of recovery, health psychologist therapists can improve the quality of life of the patient by helping the patient recover at least some of his or her psychological well-being. Health psychologists are also concerned with providing therapeutic services for the bereaved.

 

Critical analysis of health policy

Critical health psychologists explore how health policy can influence inequities, inequalities and social injustice. These avenues of research expand the scope of health psychology beyond the level of individual health to an examination of the social and economic determinants of health both within and between regions and nations. The individualism of mainstream health psychology has been critiqued and deconstructed by critical health psychologists using qualitative methods that zero in on the health experience.

Adrena Cindrella Posted on: Sep 20, 2021