Physical Activity and Healthy Eating
Rachael E. Docking, Jennifer Stock in International Handbook of Positive Aging, 2017
The discipline of health psychology is concerned with the application of psychology to the understanding of health and illness. It has been at the forefront of understanding the psychological, social and environmental factors that may hinder engagement in behaviours to promote health, as well as the development of behaviour change interventions. However, within health psychology the greatest focus in terms of health behaviour change has been in younger populations. When applied to understanding health in older populations, the focus has tended to be on managing ill health and functional decline associated with aging rather than on aging well (Peel, McClure & Barlett, 2005). While managing ill health in older adults is important, as it is at any age, this chapter will present a case for the importance of promoting and supporting health behaviours, specifically physical activity and healthy eating, in older age as a means to maximise health and promote positive aging.
Psychological principles and health behaviour change
Lisette van Gemert-Pijnen, Saskia M. Kelders, Hanneke Kip, Robbert Sanderman in eHealth Research, Theory and Development, 2018
Another approach that is important for interventions is health psychology, which examines how people’s behaviour, personality and emotions influence their health. Matarazzo (1982) defined health psychology as an aggregate field in psychology, involving educational, scientific and professional contributions, and accomplishing a variety of ends: the promotion and maintenance of health, the prevention and treatment of illness, the identification of etiologic and diagnostic correlates of health, illness and related dysfunction, and to the analysis and improvement of the healthcare system and health policy formation. A more recent analysis streamlines the definition as ‘an interdisciplinary field concerned with the application of psychological knowledge and techniques to health, illness and healthcare’ (Marks et al., 2005). Health psychology emphasizes the role of psychological factors in the cause, progression and consequences of health and illness. The aims of health psychology can be divided into (1) understanding, explaining, developing and testing theory, and (2) putting theory into practice (Ogden, 2012). One of the key ways that health psychology has evolved in putting theory into practice is in attempting to understand and to change health behaviour, with a particular focus on the individual and not just population approaches to health behaviour change. Health psychologists have been developing, implementing and evaluating many in-person or paper-based interventions over the years. Recently, the field has been acknowledging the added value of technology in interventions to improve health.
Research Methods
Deborah Fish Ragin in Health Psychology, 2017
Random Sampling One goal of psychology researchers is to explain human behavior. Specifically, a goal of health psychology researchers is to explain the health behaviors or health outcomes of individuals or groups. Therefore, even though researchers conduct studies on small samples of people, the real goal is to generalize the results of their study to other similar groups in an effort to explain human behavior.
Impact of psychological profile on drug adherence and drug resistance in patients with apparently treatment-resistant hypertension
Published in Blood Pressure, 2018
Géraldine Petit, Elena Berra, Coralie M.G. Georges, Arnaud Capron, Qi-Fang Huang, Marilucy Lopez-Sublet, Franco Rabbia, Jan A. Staessen, Pierre Wallemacq, Philippe de Timary, Alexandre Persu
As a whole, our data are in agreement with theories of health psychology suggesting the existence of two important mechanisms explaining the relationship between psychological factors and the occurence and/or persistence of medical problems. The first is a physiological pathway in which psychological factors (in this case self-blame and blame of others) have a direct impact on the occurrence of physical problems and/or diseases, by affecting biological processes such as the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenergic axis [33] or the sympathetic nervous system. The second pathway is behavioral: psychological impairments (in this case, low capacity for putting things into perspective and somatization) induce behavioral changes such as risk-taking, addictions, or in this case, poor treatment adherence, which indirectly leads to the occurrence of physical problems. The interrelations between these different mechanisms, both contributing to resistant arterial hypertension, are shown schematically in Figure 2. Furthermore, given the important correlations found with the traumatic experience related variables, we suggest that whatever the mechanism leading to aTRH, psychological disturbances probably have their roots in past traumatic experiences. The percentage of traumatic experiences as well as of individuals meeting the criteria for PTSD (following the DSM-IV [26]) was indeed higher in our aTRH sample compared to what is usually reported in the normal population [34]. In particular, highly traumatic events as the premature death of a close family, rape, violence or abuse were remarkably often reported.
Development of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) education for clinical psychologists: An example from Indonesia
Published in International Journal of Mental Health, 2020
Andrian Liem, Peter A. Newcombe
The majority of participants agreed that CAM education would be better if taught at the masters level before the professional internship phase. CAM knowledge that is considered more acceptable by clients might be needed in a professional internship as a guideline in providing more holistic psychoeducation or designing psychological intervention (Lesmana et al., 2015). However, some participants suggested that CAM education should also be introduced at the undergraduate level. Medical students in Australia also agreed that CAM should be integrated into their education from the first to final year so that students feel comfortable learning about CAM (Templeman et al., 2015). Therefore, basic information about CAM might be offered as an elective course or integrated into health psychology course as suggested by earlier studies with nurses (Booth-LaForce et al., 2010) and pharmacy students (Al-Rukban et al., 2012).
Management of sport-related concussion in emergency departments in England: a multi-center study
Published in Brain Injury, 2021
Haroon Rashid, Smarak Mishra, Nick Dobbin
After initial consultation and checking staff profiles, an estimated total sample of 300 EDCs were identified spread across 24 sites. ED consultant leads from 15 sites responded to our invite and distributed the survey to their colleagues meeting the inclusion criteria. One hundred and fifteen participants returned the survey including those in EDs and urgent care centers in the North West of England who were working substantively in EDs or were in an emergency medicine training programme, including nurse practitioners. A total of four survey responses were excluded as they included doctors working in EDs in short placements such as foundation doctors trainees and short-term locum doctors, resulting in a final sample of 111 surveys. Ethics approval for this study was granted by the Faculty of Health, Psychology and Social Care ethics committee at Manchester Metropolitan University and consent was is implied by the participant returning the questionnaire.
Related Knowledge Centers
- Clinical Psychology
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