Health Psychology Midterm 2 (PSC 126)

which of the following are brain regions associated with processing that can be activated by social experiences:

nucleus accumbens

Relationship between social relationships/social support and mortality

recent metal analysis by Holt-Lunstad and Smith (2012) suggests that social relationships are an important predictor of longevity/mortality - the effect size is comparable to that of some health behaviors (smoking) and stronger than that of other health behaviors (physical activity) or environmental factors (air pollution).

Stages in collective coping with tragedy

recommendations: -1) identify the feelings that you may be experiencing. Understand that your feelings are normal reaction to an abnormal situation. - 2)remember that you have overcome adversity in the past. Try to remember what you did that helped you cope in that situation. - 3) talk to others about your fears. its Okay to ask for help - 4) make efforts to maintain your usual routine - 5) think positively. realize that things will get better. be realistic about the time it takes to feel better. - 6) recognize the nature of terrorist attacks creates fear and uncertainty about the future. Continue to do the things in your life that you enjoy. Don't get preoccupied with the things you cannot control to the extent that they prevent you from living your normal life. - 7) know the actions our government is taking to combat terrorism and restore safety and security. Recognize that trained officials throughout the country are mobilized to prevent, prepare for and respond to terrorist attacks. collective coping with tragedy 1) emergency stage 2) inhibition stage 3) adaptation stage

control-enhancing interventions

use information, relaxation, and cognitive behavioral techniques, such as learning to think differently about the unpleasant sensations of a procedure, to reduce anxiety, improve coping and promote recovery. - However, control may actually be aversive if it gives people more responsibility and they want.

Health belief model

whether person practices a health behavior depend on two factors: whether the person perceives the personal health threat, and whether the person believes that our particular health practice will be effective in reducing that threat. - factors influencing health behavior practices - perceived health threat - perceived threat reduction - used to increase perceived risk and perceived effectiveness of steps to modify health habits. criticism of health belief model: it leaves out self-efficacy which is ones ability to control his or her own practice of a particular behavior.

Benefits of behavioral assignments

(1) the client becomes involved in the treatment process (2) the client produces an analysis of the behavior that is useful in planning further interventions, (3) the client becomes committed to the treatment process to a contractual agreement to discharge certain responsibilities, (4) responsibility for behavior changes gradually shifted to the client, and (5) the use of homework assignments increases the client's sense of self-control.

coping interventions

(1) mindfulness meditation and acceptance/commitment therapy: mindfulness meditation teaches people to strive for state of Mind marked by heightened awareness of the present, focusing on the moment and accepting and acknowledging it without becoming distracted or distressed by stress. Can improve quality of life, reduce anxiety, and improve coping. Mindfulness-based stress reduction is systematic training in mindfulness to help people manage the reactions to stress and the negative emotions that may result. mindfulness in gauges the prefrontal cortex cortisol region of the brain, which regulate effects and down regulate activity in the limbic areas related to anxiety and other negative emotions. Acceptance and commitment therapy incorporates acceptance of a problem, mild focus regarding its occurrence and the conditions that elicited, and commitment to behavior change. The goal is to try to change the private experience and thereby maintain commitment and teaches people to notice their thoughts in a mindful manner and from a distance so as to be able to respond more flexibly to them. - ACT therapy teaches individuals to (1) accept the problem, (2) be aware of its occurrence and conditions that cause it (3) change behaviors. (2) Expressive writing colon disclosing emotions can have beneficial effects on health. the ability to confide in others or to consciously confront one's feelings may reduce the need to obsess about and inhibit the event, which may, in turn, reduce the physiological activity associated with the event. when people I've talked about or written about traumatic events, psychological and physiological indicators of stress can be reduced. (3) Self-affirmation: people positively affirm their values, they feel better about themselves and show lower physiological activity and distress. writing about important social relationships appears to be the most impactful self-affirmation task. Can reduce defensiveness about personally relevant risk information and consequently make people more receptive to reducing the risk. - helps individuals feel better about themselves. - lowers physiological activity and stress - undermines defensive reactions to health threats. (4) Relaxation training: include deep breathing, progressive muscle relaxation training, guided imagery, Transcendental Meditation, yoga, and self-hypnosis. Can reduce heart rate, muscle tension, blood pressure, and inflammatory activity, lipid levels, anxiety, and tension. - affects to physiological experience of stress by reducing arousal - deep breathing - progressive muscle relaxation training - guided imagery - transcendental mediation and yoga. - self hypnosis (5) Coping skills training: teaching people effective coping techniques. most interventions drawn principles from cognitive behavioral therapy. Teaches people how to appraise stressful events in this aggregate the stressors into specific tasks. Distinguishes those aspects of a stressor that may be changeable from those that are not. (6) Stress Management: typically involves three phases first participants learn what stress is and how to identify the stressors in their own lives. Two, they acquire and practice skills for coping with stress and finally they practiced the coping techniques in targeted stressful situations and monitor their effectiveness. (7) Combat Stress Now (CSN): 1) identifying stressors, 2) monitoring stress, 3) identifying stress antecedents, 4) avoiding negative self-talk, 5) completing take-home assignments, 6) acquiring skills, 7) setting new goals, 8) engaging a positive self-talk and self-instruction, 9) Using other cognitive behavioral techniques: time management helps people set specific goals, establish priorities, and avoid time wasters, and learn what to ignore. Stress carriers: people in their environment for calls them special stress.

Negative affectivity

(also called neurotism) a pervasive negative mood marked by anxiety, depression, and hostility. Related to poor health, including such chronic disorders as arthritis, diabetes, chronic pain and coronary artery disease. - Negative affectivity is also related to all cause mortality. Psychological distress involving depression, anger, hostility, and anxiety may form the core of a disease prone personality that predisposes people high in negative effect to illness.

Why are help habits relatively independent of each other and unstable?

- different help habits are controlled by different factors. For example, Smoking may be related to stress. Second, different factors may control the same health behavior for different people. One person's overeating may be social, and she may eat primarily in the presence of other people, whereas another person may over-eat only when under stress. - Third, factors controlling a health behavior may change over the history of the behavior. Peer pressure is important in initiating smoking, however, smoking may be maintained because it reduces feelings of stress. - Fourth, doctors controlling a health behavior may change across a person's lifetime.

how social support benefits health

- direct effects hypothesis: social support is generally beneficial during non-stressful as well as stressful time. - buffering hypotheses: physical and mental health benefits of social support are chiefly evident during periods of high stress. - research supports both hypothesis. So social relations both attenuate the impact of stressors but they also provide more direct positive benefits during non stressful times.

Direct effects versus buffering hypothesis of how social support benefits health

- direct effects hypothesis: social support is generally beneficial during non-stressful as well as stressful times. - buffering hypothesis: physical and mental health benefits of social support are chiefly evident during periods of high stress

message framing

- health messages can be phrased in positive or negative terms. - Messages that emphasized problems seem to work better for behaviors that have uncertain outcomes, for health behaviors that need to be practiced only once, such as vaccinations, and for issues about which people are fearful. - Messages that stress benefits are more persuasive for behaviors with certain outcomes. People who have a promotion or approach orientation that emphasizes maximizing opportunities are more influenced by messages framed in terms it benefits, whereas people who have a prevention or avoidance orientation that emphasizes minimizing risks are more influenced by messages that stress the risks of not performing a health behavior. - On the whole, promotion-oriented messages may be somewhat more successful in getting people to initiate behavior change, and prevention messages may be more helpful in getting them to maintain behavior changes over time.

Psychosocial resources and examples

- optimism: promotes active and persistent coping efforts. - psychosocial control: belief that one can exert control over stressful events. - self-esteem: associated with lower levels of stress indicators - conscientiousness: may help avoid harmful coping strategies and promote positive health behaviors or compliance with treatment. - self-confidence: helps identify resources for coping - being smart: associated with problem-solving skills. - emotional stability: ability to remains calm under stress and to regulate ones emotions effectively.

Coping outcomes

- reducing or eliminating stressors - tolerating or adjusting to negative events or realities - maintaining a positive self-image - maintaining emotional equilibrium - continuing satisfying relationships with others - enhancing recovery when ill - keeping low physiological, neuroendocrine, and immune reactivity.

examples of resources that promote resilience

- sense of coherence and purpose about life - sense of humor and trust in others - sense that life is worth living. - religious beliefs

Approach versus avoidance coping style

1) avoidant (minimizing) coping style: People who cope with stress by minimizing or avoiding threatening events May deal effectively with short-term threats. Fared worse psychologically over the long-term. 2) Approach (confrontative, vigilant) coping style: this style is more successful as it is tied to better mental and physical health outcomes. May pay short-term price and anxiety and physiological reactivity as they confront stressful events, but be better off in the long term.

Alameda County Study, seven positive health habits

1) sleeping 7 to 8 hours a night 2) not smoking 3) eating breakfast every day 4) having no more than one or two alcoholic drinks each day 5) getting regular exercise 6) not eating between meals 7) being no more than 10% overweight

stages of coping process

1) stressful event, its stage and anticipated future course 2) appraisal and interpretation of the stressor 3) coping responses and strategies 4) coping tasks 5) coping outcomes

Health regulation model versus mating market model of marital satisfaction and weight

169 newlywed couples followed for 4 years - tested two competing models 1) health regulation model: supportive relationships regulate healthy behaviors prediction: happy marriage --> healthier weight 2) mating market model: weight maintenance is motivated by wanting to attract a mate prediction: unhappy marriage --> healthier weight profile over time the mating market model was correct. Found that those who were happier gained a little more weight over time and those who were unhappy actually had somewhat more healthy weight profile overall.

A window of vulnerability

A time when food choices, snacking and dieting all crystallized.

____ is feeling a loss of control that results when a person has violated self-imposed rules.

Abstinence violation effect

Ethnic and gender differences in health risks and habits

African-American and Hispanic women get less exercise and Anglo women and are more likely to be overweight. - Anglo and African American women are more likely to smoke than a Hispanic women. - Alcohol consumption is a greater problem among men than women, and smoking is a somewhat greater problem for Anglo men than for other groups. - culturally appropriate interventions include consideration of health practice in the community, informal networks of communications that can make the intervention more successful, and language.

Social support interventions

An important resource for people who have chronic Health disorders such as cancer, spinal cord injury, end-stage renal disease, and cardiovascular disease. Older adults with Alzheimer's, for example, are especially likely to use such services. - family support: Family Support enhances has the patient's physical and emotional function, promotes adherence to treatment, and it improves the course of health disorders. Can remind the patient about activities. However, they need guidance to avoid actions that could actually make things worse such as encouraging a person with a chronic health disorder to be relentlessly cheerful. - support group: Represent a resource for people who have chronic health disorders. Some are initiated by therapists or are patient-led. Discuss issues of mutual concern, provide specific information about how others have dealt with the problems, and if give patients the opportunity to share their emotional responses with others.

Problem-focused versus emotion-focused coping

Problem-focused: attempting to do something constructive about the stressful conditions. emotion-focused coping: regulating emotions experienced due to the stressful event.

Stimulus control intervention

Involves reading the environment of discriminative stimuli that you booked the problem behavior, and trading new discriminative stimuli, signaling that a new response will be reinforced.

What links chronic negative affect to illness?

Negative affectivity is related to elevated levels of stress indicators such as cortisol, heart rate, inflammation, and risk factors for coronary heart disease. - A second link is poor health habits. People high in negative affect are more likely to drink heavily and use drugs and also respond to treatment more poorly, which may hasten the course of illness or death. - It can also create a false impression of poor health when none exist. They report more physical symptoms, such as headaches and other pains, especially under stress

Self-affirmation

Occurs when people reflect upon their important values, personal qualities, or social relationships. I become less defensive about personally relevant risk-related information which can set the stage for behavior change.

Resilience

Psychological resources not only enabled people to confront and cope with stressors but they also help them bounce back from bad experiences and adapt flexibly to the challenging demands of stressful situations. A sense of coherence about one's life, a sense of purpose or meaning in one's life, a sense of humor, trusting others, I sense that life is worth living, and religious beliefs are all resources that promote resilience, effective coping, and health.

Self-monitoring

Self-monitoring assesses the frequency of a target behavior and the antecedents and consequences of that behavior. Person must understand the dimensions of the poor health habit before change can begin. - First step is to learn to discriminate the target behavior. - A second stage is charting the behavior. - Discriminative stimulus signals that are positive reinforcement will subsequently occur.

Ajzen's theory of planned behavior

a health behavior is the direct result of a behavioral intention. Behavioral intentions or themselves made up of three components: attitudes toward the specific action (Likely outcomes of the action and evaluations of those outcomes), subjective norms regarding the action ( what a person believes others think that person should do, normative beliefs), and perceived behavioral control (perception that one can perform the action and that the action will have the intended effect) - health behaviors are as a result of a behavioral intention or plan - behavioral intentions have three components 1) attitudes toward actions 2) subjective norms regarding actions 3) perceived behavioral control toward action

Transtheoretical Model Behavior change

a model that analyzes the stages and processes people go through in bringing about a change in behavior and suggested treatment goals and interventions for each stage. - Precontemplation: occurs when a person has no intention of changing his or her behavior. - contemplation: stage in which people are aware that they have a problem and I was thinking about it I have not yet made a commitment to take action. - preparation: people intend to change their behavior but have not yet done so successfully. - Action: people modify their behavior to overcome the problem. Requires the commitment of time and energy to making real Behavior change. - maintenance: people work to prevent relapse and to consolidate the gains and made.

Health promotion

a philosophy that has as its core the idea that good health, or wellness, is a personal and collective achievement. For the individual, it involves developing a program of good health habits, and for the medical practitioner, health promotion involves teaching people how to achieve a healthy lifestyle and helping people at risk for particular health problems offset or monitor those risks.

tertiary prevention

a strategy that aims to soften the impact of an ongoing illness or injury that has lasting effects. This is done by helping people manage long-term, often complex health problems and injuries. examples: hospice care, stroke rehabilitation program.

James is a lawyer who used to work at the world trade center until the 9/11 attacks took place. He survived the building collapse but was diagnosed with PTSD soon after. Over the next few months, he spent time gathering information on the attack, talking to other survivors, and organizing resources for them. which of the following coping styles is James using?

approach coping style

perceived barriers

aspects of one's life that interfere with practicing good health behaviors

Ethical issues

at what point is it appropriate to alarm at-risk people if the personal risk is unknown? not everyone at risk for a particular disorder will develop the problem and, in many cases, only many years later. Psychological distress may be created in exchange for instilling risk education behaviors.

criticism of attitude theories

attitude change techniques assume that behavior changes are guided by conscious motivation, and these approaches ignore the fact that some Behavior change the cars automatically and is not subject to awareness. - A general limitation of health behavior change models is the fact that they heavily and the size conscious deliberative processes in practicing Health behaviors and an important role for implicit automatic processes as well.

Fear Appeals:

attitudinal approaches to changing health habits that assume that if people are afraid that a particular habit is hurting their health, they will change their behavior to reduce Their Fear. However, this relationship does not always hold. Beer can increase defensiveness, which reduces how effective and appeal will be.

Cognitive-behavioral approaches -self-control of behavior and cognitive restructuring

cognitive-behavior therapy: uses complementary methods to intervene in the modification of a target problem and its context - classical conditioning: pairing of an unconditioned reflex with a new stimulus - produces a conditioned reflex - heavily depends on the clients willingness -example: the drug Antabuse which helps treat people who abuse alcohol. people have to be willing to take this drug that makes them nauseous if the ingest alcohol in combination with the drug. this reflex helps condition people to associate nausea with drinking. - Operant conditioning: pairs a voluntary behavior with systematic consequences. - reinforcement and its schedule are important - example: provide a reward every time a child engages in a healthy behavior - modeling: learning that occurs from witnessing another person perform a behavior - stimulus control interventions: ridding the environment of discriminative stimulus that evoke the problem behavior. - creating new discriminative stimuli, signaling that a new response will be reinforced. - self-monitoring: understanding the dimensions of ones poor health habit before change can begin. - cognitive reconstructing: trains people to recognize and modify their internal monologues to promote health behavior change. - self-reinforcement: systemically rewarding oneself to increase or decrease the occurrence of a target behavior. - contingency contracting: effective form of behavior modification that involves a constract betwen

coping and external resources

coping is influenced by external resources such as time, money, education, a decent job, friends, family, standards of living, the presence of positive life events, and absence of other life stressors. - People with greater resources typically cope with stressful events better, because it simply provides more ways of dealing with a stressful event. One potent external resource to health is socioeconomic status. - People with low SES have fewer medical and psychiatric disorders of all kinds and they show lower mortality from all causes of death.

Coping style, definition and distinction between avoidant and approach coping style

coping style: propensity to deal with stressful events in a particular way. Two general ways - avoidant coping style: coping by avoiding threat - approach coping style: coping by gathering information or directly taking action against threat.

What factors lead one person to live a healthy life and another to compromise his or her health? Determinants of health behaviors, examples

demographic factors, age, values, personal control (eg. health locus of control), social influence, personal goals and values, perceived symptoms, access to the healthcare delivery system, knowledge and intelligence, barriers to modifying poor health behaviors, emotional factors, and instability of health behaviors. - emotional factors may lead to unhealthy behaviors - instability of health behaviors - different factors control different health habits - different factors may control the same health behavior for different people - different factors control a health behavior over the history of a behavior - different factors control a health behavior across a persons lifetime. implications for intervention - socialization: influence of parents as both teachers and role models - teachable moment: better times for modifying health practices - window of vulnerability: childhood and adolescence are times when students are first exposed to bad habits - precautions taken in adolescence may affect disease risk after age 45

Matching hypothesis

different kinds of stressful events create different needs, and social support is most effective when it meets those needs.

Moderation of stress by social support

direct effect hypothesis maintains that social support is generally beneficial during stressful times. The buffering hypothesis maintains that the physical and mental health benefits of social support are chiefly evident during periods of high stress when there's little stress, social support may offer few such benefits. - People with more social confidence, lower social anxiety, and that are self-disclosure skills to help more effective social support networks and we're more likely to form friendships.

the ___ hypothesis maintains that social support is generally beneficial during non-stressful as well as stressful times.

direct effects

Educational appeals versus fear appeals to change behavior

educational appeal: people change their health habits if they have good information about their habits fear appeals: people change their attitudes if they fear that a particular habit is hurting their health

secondary prevention

efforts that aim to reduce the impact of a disease or injury that has already occurred. eg. giving people low dose aspirin who had a heart attack to prevent future heart attacks, removing a pre-cancerous mole to prevent skin cancer, take blood pressure medication to reduce risk of stroke.

Health promotion and older adults

focused on several behaviors: maintaining a healthy, balanced diet, maintaining a regular exercise regimen, taking steps to reduce accidents, controlling alcohol consumption, eliminating smoking, reducing the inappropriate use of prescription drugs, obtaining vaccinations against influenza, and remaining socially engaged.

Cognitive behavior therapy

focuses on the target behavior itself, the condition that elicits and maintain it, and the factors that reinforce it. - The most effective approach to health habit modification. - Emphasis self-control. - Cognitive reconstructing trains people to recognize and modify their internal monologues to promote health behavior change. Sometimes the modified cognitions are antecedents to a target behavior. - Benefits: a carefully selected set of techniques can deal with all aspects of a problem, the therapeutic plan can be tailored to each individual's problem And the range of skills imported by multimodal interventions may enable people to modify several health habits simultaneously, such as diet and exercise, rather than one at a time.

organized religion provides a sense of ___ to people.

group identity

self-determination theory (SDT)

guides health behavior modification, build on the idea that people are actively motivated to pursue their goals. targets important components as fundamental to behavior change, namely autonomous motivation (experience free will and choice when making decisions) and perceived competence (the belief that one is capable of making the health behavior change). - people are actively motivated to pursue their goals - components fundamental to behavior change: autonomous motivation and perceived competence

Health habit

health behavior that is firmly established and often performed automatically without awareness. These habits usually develop in childhood and begin to stabilize around age 11 or 12.

Perceived Health threat

influenced by at least three factors: (1) General Health values, which include interest in and concern about health, (2) specific beliefs about personal vulnerability to a particular disorder, and (3) beliefs about the consequences of the disorder, such as whether they are serious. Whether a person believes a help measure will reduce the threat has to suck components: whether the person thinks the health practice will be effective, and whether the cost of undertaking that measure exceeds its benefits.

social support

information from others that one is loved and cared for, esteemed and valued, and part of a network of communication and mutual obligations. Can come in the form of tangible assistance which involves the provision of material support such a services, financial assistance, or goods. information support, we're friends and family provide information about the exact steps involved in a certain procedure for example. - Emotional support to reassure the person that he or she is valuable. Social support can lower the likelihood of illness, speed recovery from illness or treatment, reduce the risk of mortality due to serious disease, typically benefits health behaviors and they're more likely to use health services. - However, it can also lead to some bad health habits such as when ones peers smokes, drinks heavily, takes drugs or when a lot of social contact is coupled with stress. Social support can reduce physiological and neuroendocrine responses to stress, reduce cortisol responses to stress, better immune functioning, with less accumulation of allostatic load, and with less cellular aging.

Primary prevention

installing good health habits and changing poor ones. Taking measures to combat risk factors for illness before an illness has the chance to develop. two strategies include getting people to alter their problematic health behaviors such as helping people lose weight through an intervention or a more recent approach is to keep people from developing poor habits in the first place. eg. vaccinations, quitting smoking before developing lung cancer, and teaching children mindfulness or other stress coping strategies.

Problem-focused coping

involves attempts to do something constructive about the stressful conditions that are harming, threatening, or challenging an individual. Work-related problems benefit from problem-focused coping, such as taking direct action or seeking help from others. Situations in which something constructed can be done. 2) Emotional focused coping involves efforts to regulate emotions experienced due to stressful event. typically people use both coping styles to manage stressful events. Health problems lead to more emotional focused coping because health threats often must be tolerated but may not be amenable to direct action. Situations that simply must be accepted.

Emotional approach coping

involves clarifying, focusing on, and working through the emotions experienced in response to a stressor. Improves adjustment to many chronic conditions, including chronic pain, and medical condition such as pregnancy and breast cancer. - Appears to be especially beneficial for women. - Can be soothing and beneficial effects stress regulatory systems, and it may lead people to affirm important aspect of their identity which leads to health benefits.

self-reinforcements

involves systemically rewarding oneself to increase or decrease the occurrence of a target behavior. - Contingency Contracting is when an individual forms a contract with another person, such as a therapist or one spouse, detailing what Rewards or punishments or contingent on the performance or non-performance of a behavior.

self-esteem

is associated with lower levels of stress indicators, such as HPA axis activity, which may be the route by which self-esteem affect illness, in addition, people with stronger self related resources have better health habits, being somewhat less likely to smoke or use alcohol.

Education Appeals

make the assumption that people will change their health habits if they have good information about their habits.

which of the following involves the provision of services, financial, assistance, or goods?

material support

which model do you think was correct?

mating market model

Health locus of control scale

measures the degree to which people perceive their health to be under personal control, control by the health practitioners, or chance.

individuals who display high negative affectivity are:

more likely to have a disease prone personality

high levels of negative affectivity: individuals who display negative affectivity are:

more likely to have a disease-prone personality

Relationship between religious beliefs and health

multiple pathways - many religions prohibit unhealthy behaviors (Tabaco, excessive alcohol use, risky sexual behavior) or teach that the body should be respected and cared for. - social support and community involvement are known to be associated with health-protective effects even in non-religious contexts - can promote self-esteem and identity development - can reduce anxiety about the unknown and death - can increase sense of control criticisms of this research - much of this research is correlational, so in many studies it is difficult to rule out the possibility that religious and non-religious individuals also differ in other ways.

Personality and coping -negative affectivity versus positive affectivity

negative affectivity - marked by anxiety, depression, and hostility. - related to: poor health, all-cause mortality, higher levels of stress indicators - associated with poor health habits - associated with poor responses to treatment - can create an illusion of poor health positive affectivity - promotes better mental and physical health. linked with lower levels of stress indicators - triggers better immune responses - improves coping

a smoker chooses to rip up a $1 bill each time he smokes a cigarette. This is an example of self-reinforcement is called:

negative self-punishment

Jill has always dreaded weighing herself on her bathroom scale. After successfully meeting her weight loss goal, she finally stored it away out of sight. This is an example of:

negative self-reward

neural activity (examples of neural regions activated by social support)

neuroimaging study of 15 individuals in the first 9 months of a romantic relationship - subjected to thermal pain and randomly assigned to one of the three conditions 1) view picture of romantic partner 2) view picture of stranger 3) word associated task (distraction) - viewing image of romantic partner and word association task significantly reduced pain - in addition, romantic partner image activated brain regions associated with reward processing (caudate head, nucleus accumbens, lateral orbitofrontal cortex, amygdala, and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex)

Psychosocial resources optimism

optimists have a better physiological stress profiles an indicator such as cortisol, blood pressure, and inflammation. - Optimism also promotes active and persistent coping efforts, which improves long-term prospects for psychological and physical health. - It fosters a sense of personal control, they use problem-focused coping, seek social support from others, and emphasize the positive aspects of stressful situation.

Socialization

parents instill certain habits in their children, or not, that become automatic, such as brushing one's teeth regularly and eating breakfast every day. - Nonetheless, many families do not instill even these most basic habits. Adolescents are also exposed to bad habits particularly if their parents are not monitoring them closely and if their peers practice these behaviors.

Health behaviors

patterns of disease have changed substantially. a decline in acute infectious disorders but an increase in preventable disorders including cancer, cardiovascular disease, alcohol, drug abuse, and vehicle accidents. - Nearly half the deaths in the US are caused by preventable factors with the three main causes being smoking, obesity, and problem drinking.

proactive coping

people anticipate potential stressors and acting advance, either to prevent them or to reduce their impact. Requires 1) the ability to anticipate or detect potential stressors, 2) coping skills for managing them, and 3) self-regulatory skills which are the ways that people control, direct, and correct their actions as the attempt to counter potential stressful events.

Educational appeals make the assumption that:

people will change their health habits if they have good information about their habits

Positivity and illness

positive emotional functioning promotes better mental and physical health and a longer life. - Positive emotional states have been tied to lower levels of stress indicators such as cortisol and better immune responses the challenges such as exposure to a flu virus. They also invest more time and effort to overcome obstacles in pursuit of their goals which may affect their mood and lower their stress levels.

Self-control of behavior

positive self reward: + :) eg. reward yourself by buying and eating cake negative self-reward: - :) eg. reward yourself by not doing the dishes Positive self-punishment: + :( eg. punish yourself by doing the dishes Negative self-punishment: _ :( eg. punish yourself by giving up cake

John Henryism

prolonged, high-effort active coping with psychosocial environmental stressors. -prevalence in African Americans - example: African Americans with JH traits tend to work through medical crises (eg. sickle cell anemia pain crisis), even though this can prolong symptoms and make work difficult.

Benefits of successful modification of health behaviors

reduce deaths due to lifestyle-related disease, may delay time of death, thereby increasing life expectancy and the practice of good health behaviors. May expand the number of years during which a person may enjoy a life free from the complications of chronic disease. Finally, it may begin to make a dent in the more than 3 trillion dollars that is spent yearly on health and illness.

what constitutes successful coping outcomes

reducing or eliminating stressors, tolerating or adjusting to negative event or realities, maintaining a positive self-image, maintaining emotional equilibrium, continuing satisfying relationships with others, enhancing the prospects of recovery if one is ill, keeping physiological, neroendocrine, and immune reactivity relatively low or restoring these systems to pre-stress levels. - Another often use criterion for a successful coping is how quickly people can return to their pre-stress activities.

Self-regulation

refers to the fact that people control their own actions, emotions and thoughts. a lot of self-regulation is automatic, occurring without awareness of thought. - But much self-regulation is conscious, designed to meet personal goals and control thoughts, emotions, and behavior and service of those goals.

Social skills

relaxation training involves deep breathing and progressive muscle relaxation. - motivational interviewing: client centered counseling style designed to get people to work through any ambivalence experience about changing their health behaviors. the interviewer adopts a non-judgmental, non-confrontational, encouraging and supporting style. - The goal is to help the client express the positive or negative thoughts they have regarding the behavior in an atmosphere that is free of negative evaluation.

which of the following is defined as the ability to bounce back from bad experiences and adapt flexibly to the changing demands of stressful situation.

resilience

Sarah is going to get a mammogram to screen for breast cancer. This is an example of which type of prevention?

secondary prevention

Self-efficacy

the belief that one can control one's practice of a particular behavior.

Biopsychosocial pathways linking social support and health: a) how social support affects cortisol responses

social support has positive effects on the cardiovascular, endocrine and immune system. - lowers physiological and neuroendocrine responses to stress - decreases cortisol responses to stress - better immune functioning - modifies brains responses to stress. How social support affects cortisol - made couples take the trier social stress test and were placed in one of three conditions; no social support, social support from stranger and social support from spouse. Those who got to prepare for this stressful public speaking task with a partner produced a less cortisol then those who prepared with a stranger or those who are alone and had no support. Our body keeps track of whether we have support or not. The male partners in the study didn't provide as effective of support to women. - another study where researchers tried to see if they could get women to experience the social buffering effect as a result of receiving social support. Women were randomly assigned to groups with no interaction, social support, and physical support. The ones who received physical support through a massage had a significantly lower cortisol levels and thus lower perceived stress.

how social networks affect immune function

social support: - lowers the likelihood of illness - speeds up recovery - reduces the risk of mortality - encourages individuals to use health services and stick to their medical regiments - can sometimes also lead to bad health habits

health behavior change in the brain:

some successful health behavior change in response to persuasive messages occurs outside of awareness. May be reflected in patterns of brain activation Especially in the medial prefrontal cortex and posterior cingulate cortex.

Teachable moments

somethings are better than others for modifying Health practices. Many teachable moments arise in early childhood. Parents can teach their children basic safety behaviors, such as looking both ways before crossing the street, and basic health habits, such as drinking milk instead of soda with dinner.

Mindfulness meditation

teaches individuals to : - have a higher awareness of the present - focus on the present and accept it - mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) programs- help people to manage their reactions to stress and the resulting negative emotions.

Coping effectiveness training (examples of skills, please see lecture and textbook)

teaches people how to: - asses stressful events - disaggregate the stressors into specific tasks encourages people to maintain their social support. general stages of stress management programs. - learning and identify stressors - acquiring and practicing skills for coping with stress - practicing the techniques stress management programs focus on the following skills: - identifying stressors - monitoring stress - avoiding negative self-talk - completing take-home assignments (eg. start stress dairy) - acquiring skills (learning new stress reduction methods) - setting new goals - engaging in positive self-talk and self-instruction - time management and planning

Psychological control

the belief that one can determine one's own behavior, influence one's environment, and bring about desired outcomes. the belief that one can exert control over stressful events has long been known to help people cope with stress. - Perceived control is closely related to self-efficacy and secondary control or collective control, maintains that through collaboration with family and friends or with medical practitioners when we successfully cope with a stressful event. - Those control need not be personal to be adaptive: the perception that other people have control that controls shared with significant other people in one's life can be beneficial. - Belief one can exert control in stressful situations improves emotional well-being, coping with a stressful event, Health behaviors, physiological stress indicators such as immune functioning and cardiovascular risk factors and health. perceived control foster's physical activity which contributes to good health.

Abstinence violation effect

the feeling of loss of control that results when a person has violated self-imposed rules.

Venues for health habit modification

the practitioners office, the family, self-help groups, schools, workplaces interventions, community-based interventions, the mass media, cellular phones and landlines, the internet.

Coping style

the propensity to deal with stressful events in a particular way.

Coping

the thoughts end behaviors used to manage the internal and external demand and situations that are appraised as stressful. two characteristics 1) the relationship between coping and a stressful event is a dynamic process. 2) Emotional reactions, including anger or depression, are part of the cooking process, as our actions that are voluntarily undertaken to confront the event.

Stress moderators

they modify how stress is experienced and the effect it has

Conscientiousness

those who are highly conscientious as children were more likely to live to an old age they may be more successful at avoiding harmful situations, they may think more about their health, they may be more adherent to treatment recommendations, they practice good health habits and they use their cognitive abilities effectively. They may consequently have lower stress-related biomarkers.

External resources for coping -examples

time, money, education, decent job, friends, family, standard of living, presence of positive life events, absence of other life stressors, socioeconomic stressors.