Health Psychology Exam 1: Chapter 1+2

Health Disparities 3

People with European ancestry live longer than African Americans: both groups' life expectancy shorter than many other countries. Unique health challenges for women, LGBTQ communities, and other marginalized communities.

What Do Health Psychologists Do

Teachers, research scientists, clinicians, positive psych: healthy human functioning, clinical/counseling: licensed practitioners who focus on health-promoting interventions

The Immigrant Paradox: SES and The Health of Immigrants

Although low soscioeconomic status usually predicts poor health, this is not true for Hispanics and other ethnic groups in the U.S.

Health Disparities

The U.S. ranks worst among 11 wealthy nations as measured by life expectancy, efficiency, and accessibility to quality health care by all individuals.

Health Psychology

The application of psychological principles and research to the enhancement of health and prevention and treatment of illness

Correlations DO NOT

Dismiss possible contributions of other variables, pinpoint directionality, guarantee causality

Goals and Targets of Healthy People 2020

adolescent health, physical activity, nutrition and weight status, injury and violence prevention, sleep health

Experimental Studies

usually conducted in a lab, involve statistical comparison of experimental and control groups, have high degree of control over IV and DV; random assignment eliminates preexisting group differences, limits generalizability, may involve some variables that cannot be investigated

Randomized Clinical Trial

Randomized clinical trial, one or more independent variables is directly manipulated, between-groups design, within-subjects design, community field trials

Socioeconomic status

SES measures several variables, including income, education, and occupation

Scientific Misconduct

Scientific method is the violation of accepted codes of scholarship and ethical behavior in research: fabrication, falsificaltion, plagiarism

Inferring Causality

Basic conditions must be met before cause-and-effect relationship is inferred between a risk factor and particular disease or adverse health outcome

Meta-Analysis

Combines many research studies examining the same effect or phenomenon, collects no new data, includes statistical combination of many study results, aids in making sense of conflicting reports, is replicable, has potential bias

Rethinking the Biomedical Model

Develop a more comprehensive model of health and disease- the biopsychosocial approach

Culture

Enduring behaviors, values, and customs that a group of people transmit from one generation to the next

Health Disparities 2

Ethnic majorities in cities have a higher life expectancy compared to rural, disadvantaged minorities.

The Biological Context

Every thought, mood, and urge is a biological event

Rising Health Care Costs

Focus efforts on ways to prevent disease and maintain good health to avoid these costs

Gender Perspective

Focuses on gender specific health problems and barriers to health care, addresses underrepresentation of women, POC, and older patients, as participants in medical research trials

The Sociocultural Perspective

Focuses on how social and cultural factors contribute to health and disease

Birth Cohort

Group of people born at about the same time who experience similar historical and social conditions

Health Psychology Research

Health Psychologists use various research methods in the search to learn how psychological factors affect health, they also use methods from the field of epidemiology, the study of frequency, distribution, and causes of a particular disease

Emergence of Health Psychology

1978 American Psychological Association establishes the division of health psychology

Retrospective Study

A "backward looking" study in which a group of people who have a certain condition are compared with a group of people who are free of that condition (case-control studies)

Prospective Study

A "forward-looking" longitudinal study that follows a healthy group of subjects over time

Health Assets

A degree that does a mind and body good, higher education and health literacy, higher income, healthier lifestyle

Evolutionary Perspective

Adaption and Reproductive success drive trait and behavior development, biology and behavior constantly interact, most important traits are epigenetic (non genetic factors influencing gene expression)

Health Disparities 4

Higher disease and disability rates for middle-aged women than men.

Life-Course perspective

Age-related aspects of health and illness, considers leading causes of death (overall and by age groups)

Four Goals of Health Psychology

To study scientifically the causes of specific diseases and their etiology, to promote health, to prevent and treat illness, to promote public health policy and the improvement of the health care system

Epidemiological Measures

Incidence and Prevalence

Trends That Shaped Health Psychology

Increased life expectancy, rise of lifestyle disorders (cancer, stroke, heart disease), rising health care costs, rethinking the biomedical model

Health Psychology Research Methods

Independent variable, dependent, random assignment

Ethnic Group

Large groups of people who tend to have similar values and experiences because they share certain characteristics

Identification of Actions and Targets For Improving Health Services

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services report, Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act

Association versus causation

Mistaking statements of association for statements of causation is a common error in the interpretation of research results

Observational Studies

Observance of participants' behavior and recording of relevant data, may be structured or unstructured

Descriptive Studies

Often conducted wherever people spend time, includes case studies, surveys and interviews, and naturalistic observation. Permit the gathering of in-depth information about one person that often leads to a new hypothesis. You have no direct control over variables and are subject to bias of observer and single cases may be misleading

Health

State of complete physical, mental, and social well-being

Correlation Coefficient

Statistical measure of the relationship between two variables (direction and strength)

Quasi-Experiments

Uses comparison groups that differ on the variables of interest at the outset of the study (baseline)

The Social Context

Ways people think about, influence, and relate to one another and the environment

Examples of Quasi-Experiment

active versus sedentary people, women versus men, high versus low socioeconomic status, smokers versus nonsmokers

Conditions needed to be met for causality

consistent evidence, appearance of alleged cause before appearance of disease, relationship that makes sense, dose-response relationship between risk factor and health outcome, strength of association, incidence or prevalence of disease or other health outcomes must drip when alleged causal factor is removed

Mortality

death, the number of deaths due to a specific cause in a given group at a given time

Morbidity

disease, the number of cases of a specific illness, injury, or disability in a given group of people at a given time

Rise of Lifestyle Disorders

educate people to avoid the behaviors that contribute to these diseases (for example, smoking and eating a high-fat diet)

Confirmation Bias

form of faulty reasoning in which expectations prevent people from seeing alternative explanations for their observations

How Do You Become a Health Psychologist

general psych training at the undergraduate level, special training at the doctoral level, internship in a hospital, clinic, or other medical setting

The Psychological Context

health and illness are subject to psychological influences- evaluation and interpretation of stressful experiences, ones attitude and treatment effectiveness, and psychological interventions

Where do the majority of health psychologists work

independent practice, then education, then hospitals, then other human services, then government

APA Guidelines

informed consent, protection from harm, guarantee of confidentiality, and debriefing

Critical Thinking

involves questioning approach to all information and arguments

Longitudinal Study

observes single group of people over a long span of time (multiple time points), is "design of choice" in life-span research, yet time-consuming, expensive to conduct, and results can be skewed if there is a large dropout rate

Etiology

origins

Increased Life Expectancy

recognize the need to take better care of ourselves to promote vitality through a longer life

Research Ethics

responsible researchers ensure that participation is voluntary, harmless, and confidential

Positive Psychology

the field of positive psychology has given rise to many studies of the importance of subjective well-being and sense of satisfaction with life

Incidence

the number of new cases of a disease or condition that occur in a specific population within a defined time interval

Prevalence

the total number of diagnosed cases of a disease or condition that exist at a given time

Discrepancies

there are wide discrepancies not only among ethnic groups, but also within Latinos in the US: Mexicans, Puerto Ricans, Cubans, regional, state and neighborhood differences in U.S.

Evidence-based medicine

uses current best evidence in making decisions about the care of individual patients or the delivery of health services

Epidemiological Studies

usually conducted in field, use statistical comparison between groups exposed to different risk factors, are useful in determining disease etiology, often easily replicated, good generalizability, time consuming and expensive