Health Psychology and Principles of Behavior Change: Report on Obesity

This report provides a critical analysis of obesity through the lens of health psychology and behavior change principles. It begins with an introduction that outlines the scope of the report, focusing on a scenario involving obesity within a lower-income family in the United States. The report then applies the biopsychosocial model to understand the multifaceted nature of obesity, considering biological, psychological, and social factors. It explores health psychology theories, particularly the Health Belief Model and Social Cognitive Theory, to explain health behavior change. The report identifies and explores potential interventions, including brief interventions and motivational interviewing, and discusses contextual, environmental, and political factors impacting health behaviors and sustainability. The report concludes by discussing the strengths and limitations of the interventions, providing a comprehensive overview of the topic.

Health psychology and
principles of behaviour change

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
Critical analysis of scenario with the help of biopsychosocial model of health..........................1
Consideration of health psychology and theories of health behaviour change with respect to
scenario........................................................................................................................................3
Identifying and exploring possible interventions........................................................................4
Critically examining contextual, environmental and political facilitation and inhibiting factors
that can impact health behaviours and sustainability..................................................................6
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................7
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................8

INTRODUCTION
Health psychology helps in addressing the issues that the society may be facing. The chosen
scenario for the report is obesity where two people, belonging to lower income class family have
been facing obesity issues in United States (Sallis, Owen and Fisher, 2015). The report makes
comprehensive discussion regarding biopsychosocial model that can have adopted by them to
their health. Further, analysis will be made on intervention programs that can be adopted by them
so as to reduce its impact on their health. The report then outlines regarding health psychology
and theories of health behaviour change with respect to scenario. The theory will then be able to
prove to be successful in variety of health-related behaviours, inclusive of cessation, smoking,
development of unhealthy or health eating habits, exercising regularly, etc. The report then
outlines contextual, environmental and political facilitation and inhibiting factors that can impact
health behaviours and sustainability. In the end, strength and limitation of all the chosen
intervention will be briefly discussed in the report.
Critical analysis of scenario with the help of biopsychosocial model of health
Biopsychosocial model, in broader sense, helps in attributing disease outcome in order to
elaborate variable interaction of biological factors such as biomedical and genetics,
psychological factors like personality mood and behaviour and social factors which are family
related, socioeconomic and cultural as well as medal factors (Peters, De Bruin and Crutzen,
2015). The model can help in determining cause, manifesting it and ultimately deriving the
outcomes related to wellness and disease. Generally, it is the duty of health care professionals to
work with people and help them in dealing with psychological and emotional aspects related to
illness and health. Increasing the adherence to medical treatments, smoking cessations and
weight loss program can effectively help in dealing with this issue (Maddux, 2016). Prevention
and intervention programs are designed to stick to healthier lifestyle in the form of increase in
intake of nutrition and promote exercise.
There are majorly eight goals of health psychology. These are:
 Understanding contextual and behavioural factors that are directly linked to illness and
health.
 Prevention of illness
 Investigation on consecutive effect of disease (Hayes, 2016)
 To provide critical analysis of various health policies
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 To conduct researches that can help in prevention and interventions of health issues
 To improve the communication between doctor and patient
 To improve patient’s adherence to medical advice
 To find the treatment that can help in managing pain (Maddux, 2016).
Health psychology helps in addressing issues of population and individual level across four main
domains. These are public, clinical, social justice and community. Clinical health psychology
helps in applying scientific knowledge to questions that belong to the spectrum of health care. It
generally focuses upon prevention and treatment of health problems. It also helps in analysing
behavioural change, an individual may experience due to clinical aspects of health. Community
health psychology helps in investigating community factors contributes to the health and
wellbeing. These interventions are generally designed with an aim to combat various diseases
and promote physical and mental health. Public health psychology helps in assessing potential
cause link between psychosocial factors at the pubic or population level (Gardner, 2015). It is
generally promoted through educators, policy formulators and other related health care providers
so that public health can be promoted at riskier groups. At the end, critical health psychology is
related to distribution of power and addressing impact of power differentials on health
behaviours, healthcare systems and other linked wellness policies (Andrews and Bonta, 2014).
Its main aim is to prioritize social justice with an objective to promote good health in a universal
manner for people of all ages, genders, races and socio-economic positions. It helps in giving
equal access of healthcare to all people.
The case discusses regarding issue of obesity where BMI results reflected that more than 35%
among low income women population in United States are obese. Obesity leads to various
medical attentions that are required to be taken by the individual (McCracken and Vowles, 2014)
. Public health can be promoted using this model as the dependence of social and behavioural
aspect can be gathered that obese women can have due to their health conditions.
Applying psychosocial model, working upon mind, body and environment; all the three factors
have a strong influence on health of an individual. None of the factors in isolation can
sufficiently lead to any type of health illness. Hence, there is a deep interrelation between
components that can help in reaching to a specific health outcome. Hence, it is important in case
of Carl and Arlene that it must be able to understand these factors and health care professionals
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must enter into understanding the core aspect of disease considering these three factors (Epton
and et.al., 2015).
Consideration of health psychology and theories of health behaviour change with respect to
scenario
Health belief model is considered to be an earliest framework that helps in understanding
the human behaviour. It stated that people tend to take their health-related actions based upon six
types of factors. These are: Perceived susceptibility: The current health condition may affect the individual or one of
feature of biopsychosocial model.
Perceived Severity: When the condition becomes severe enough that can have negative impact
on current health consequences (Tonetti and et.al., 2015). Perceived benefits: The actions advised by professionals can help in lowering, lessening or
stopping affected risk and consequences of condition of patient. Perceived cost of barriers: The corrective and preventive benefits can help in outweighing
psychological and physical harm so that appropriate behaviour can be initiated. Cues of Action: There are internal and external cue that triggers the individual to reach to
final act (Mazur, 2016).
Social cognitive theory, out of all health behaviour theories, has direct link to the situation that
has been discussed in case study. It states that there is a direct impact of individual’s observation
on adoption that can affect its behaviour towards a particular disease. There are basically two
models that are directly involved on its overall impact. One is direct modelling where people
tend to gain insights from people in the society and engage in particular behaviour. It is generally
known as vicarious learning (Martin and Pear, 2015). Symbolic modelling is another type of
model linked to social cognitive theory where people likely to adopt the behaviour of others
which they identify it has been able to portray them in media.
The theory has been able to prove to be successful in variety of health-related behaviours,
inclusive of cessation, smoking, development of unhealthy or health eating habits, exercising
regularly, etc. Specialists have also been able to adopt this model in such a manner that in order
to reduce or stop unhealthy traits among people and develop and enhance actions that are healthy
enough to be adopted. It helps in doing alteration in the behaviour in such a manner that it can
help the individual in leading a healthy life style and promote health and wellness (Head and
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Noar, 2014). This theory helps in developing dynamic interaction between people and their
behaviour and influence that has been taken from the environment. In order words, it can be
stated that people do not learn new behaviour solely by trying them or through assessment of
success or failing. Rather, survival of activities has high dependence on replication of actions.
These learned behaviours can also directly become the attention of one’s own personality.
Making the environmental factors conducive enough that can help in ultimately making certain
changes in environment setting so that adoption and abilities of the individual can be altered
(Eldredge and et.al., 2016). Campaigning regarding obesity and making people realise that
certain physical exercise and healthy eating habits can help them in lose extra weight can help in
adoption of good practices. It can help in altering personal and environmental perspectives that is
leading population of United States towards obesity. Various health promotions led by the
government do not aim to maintain the current behaviour but to initiate a behavioural change that
is impactful for the individual health (Rapport, 2014).
Hence, preparation of strategies that can help in dealing with the increased obesity will initiate
behavioural change among people. Improvement in dietary habits can help in promoting long
term nutritional behaviour can help in protecting excessive body weight. Moreover, it will also
help in preventing obesity related disease in the near future among, Carl and Arlene, who are
currently facing obesity as per the given case scenario (Kwasnicka White and Sniehotta, 2016).
Identifying and exploring possible interventions
Analysing the case study, it can be stated that, it is important to take intervention actions that can
help in reduction of obesity in the individuals. Two intervention technique have been chosen that
can be adopted by health care professionals so as to cope up with the emerging problem of
obesity (Kossek and Moen, 2014). These intervention activities are,
Brief Intervention
It is a technique which is used to initiate change in the behaviour which is unhealthy and risky
as well. Such type of behaviours can be, smoking, alcohol misuse and lack of exercising habits.
It can also be used in case of alcohol misuse as well. It acts as a prevention approach which is
typically carried out to increase the role of health (Marris, 2014)
. It is generally adopted in the two main ways. First is getting people to think differently about
unhealthy dietary and lifestyle practices adopted by them. The other is providing people the
skills that can help in consuming the unhealthy food in the most healthier manner so that its
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impact on their body is minimum. The most common aspect related to it is physical screening of
the candidate who is obese and require to adopt appropriate interventions. People with raised
body weight percentage are required to bring adequate control over their eating habits in such a
manner that it can help in overall body weight reductions (Kok and et.al., 2016). Weight
management group can also help in initiating this type of change in people belonging to
particular region as stated in the given case scenario. Motivational interviewing is one of the
technique that is adopted. The success rate of this technique has higher dependence on
information provided by the individual who is involved in taking nay type of interview (Wells,
Evans and Cheek, 2016) . It becomes important to acknowledge that each individual that is
arriving for counselling session can have different level of readiness to change their lifestyle. It
can include the following scenario:
No perception of obesity being a bane (French, Chisholm and Mc Sharry, 2014).
 Realising that obesity is a problem and has to be modified.
 Currently active address the ileus of obesity to the maximum extent
Already under maintenance and started opting for interventions that can help them in dealing
with the obesity (Seligman and Csikszentmihalyi, 2014).
Feedback is another important aspect that can be adopted to control obesity under brief
intervention. It is generally done when the assessment is complete, people tend to receive
personalised feedback from the professionals regarding their obesity aspect and other behaviours
that are related to it (Wells, Evans and Cheek, 2016). It can help in identifying that obesity is
leading them to some health risks up to what extent. Feedback can also be given based upon data
collected from other group member prior the adoption of any kind of intervention programs. It
depends on the researcher that is what way, he / she wants to collect data, it can be in the form of
questionnaire or face to face interview (Bowling, 2014). However, the limitation is, there is no
evidence that the data revealed by the individual is correct or not and higher dependence of
intervention program is on feedback only (Smith, Mackie and Claypool, 2014).
Another aspect of skills training which helps in development of the skills in people that can assist
them in consuming unhealthy food in a safer manner. Skill training programs can effectively go
with motivational interviewing techniques which can simultaneously makes the individual
regarding its importance. Moderate goals can be considered based upon their intensity to adapt
the change that is required to be brought in their lifestyle (Michie and Hardeman, 2015).
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Motivational Intervention
Motivational intervention is another kind of intervention that can be adopted to cope up with the
obesity aspect of Carl and Arlene. Obesity and being overweight is the common health issue that
can lead to increase in various health condition in the patient. Hence, it is required to be
controlled with the help of various intervention. One such type of intervention is related to
motivation. It has been assessed by the researchers that clinical practices combined with
motivation can effectively help in achieving better results in comparison to the one where only
clinical practices are adopted by the researcher on obese people(Magidson, Collado-Rodriguez
and Lejuez, 2014) . The opportunity to reinforce behavioural skills seems to be the key to reduce
the regain of weight after it has been diminished. Motivational group interventions can be more
effective in comparison to isolated clinical practices generall adopted by the health care
professionals (Pilgrim, 2017) . Psychologist must include basic training practices related to
motivating the individual for lifestyle change in obese or over weight patients. Training may
include counselling and workshop solely having this objective. Role play activity is another
method of its adoption. Patients having any type of sensory related or psychiatric disorder,
motivational intervention becomes a challenge to be adopted (Gerrig and Wilkes, 2015).
Hence, it can be evidenced that, motivational activity is effective enough that can be adopted by
the psychologist for promoting healthy lifestyle among individuals. It also help is ensuring that
clinical treatment that has been given by health care professional is adequately followed and
adoption of healthy lifestyle has been initiated by them in a well defined manner (Sarafino and
Smith, 2014) .
However, the main limitation of adoption of this kind of intervention is that it can be short
lived if individual himself is not motivated enough to practice the same. Although, continuous
session, time to time can help in leaving positive impact on its functioning (Parahoo, 2014) .
Critically examining contextual, environmental and political facilitation and inhibiting factors
that can impact health behaviours and sustainability
There are various factors that can have direct or indirect impact on health behaviour of Carl
and Arlene. Some of the factors that can affect health behaviour and sustainability of practices
are:
Contextual factor: There are certain contextual factors that acts as a barrier in properly opting
for obese related interventions. It depends upon the adoption that has been made by the
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individual from its surroundings (Pilgrim, 2017). There are higher chances that sometimes the
acts are adopted by people in ineffective manner. It depends of people that how it has been
perceived and understood and then ultimately adopted to their lifestyle. Contextual factors have
higher dependence on ecology and environment that can have adequate impact on the overall
collaboration aspect as well (Glanz, 2015).
Environmental factor: There are certain environmental factors that can affect the functioning of
an obese. Majority of the habits are generally adopted through behaviours prevailing of
environment. For instance, if one individual is involved in leading an unhealthy lifestyle and still
remaining fit, then the same will also be adopted by the other individuals as well, unknowing
their body type and immunity aspect. Hence, environmental factors play a major role in
preserving the health and well being of people (London, 2014).
Political facilitation: Inadequate amount of health promotion have a great deal of impact on
what actually have been perceived by people at a particular location. In such cases, adoption of
variety of health promotions in the form of different intensity that matches with the behavioural
accept of various individual can help in dealing with the issue. People who belongs to an
effective society will be conscious from the beginning regarding health-related campaigns and
less people staying there will be obese (Merluzzi, Yang and Conley, 2017).
Other inhibiting factors: Other inhibiting factors that has led to increased people who are obese
are, leading an unhealthy lifestyle, not aware of weight loss practices, regain of weight after
losing it once, adoption of wrong lifestyle, not aware of health risk that are linked to obesity,
prevailing socio economic issues, etc (Watkins and Nolen-Hoeksema, 2014).
CONCLUSION
Based on the above report, it can be concluded that, Prevention and intervention programs are
designed to stick to healthie lifestyle in the form of increase in intake of nutrition and promote
exercise. Health psychology help in addressing issues of population and individual level across
four main domains (McCracken and Morley, 2014)(McDaniel, 2014) . These are, public, clinical,
social justice and community. The case discuses regarding the issue of obesity where BMI
results reflected that more than 35% among low income women population in United States are
obese. Social cognitive theory, out of all health behaviour theory have direct link to the situation
that have been discussed in the case study. It states that there is direct impact of individual’s
observation on that can affect its behaviour towards a particular disease. The two types of
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interventions that are discussed in the report are, brief and motivational interventions (Sallis,
Owen and Fisher, 2015) .
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