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Lay beliefs about health and illness

from Psychology, health and illness

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2014

By
Howard Leventhal ,
Yael Benyamini  and
Cristina Shafer
Edited by
Susan Ayers ,
Andrew Baum ,
Chris McManus ,
Stanton Newman ,
Kenneth Wallston ,
John Weinman  and
Robert West
Howard Leventhal
Affiliation:
The State University of New Jersey
Yael Benyamini
Affiliation:
Tel Aviv University
Cristina Shafer
Affiliation:
The State University of New Jersey
Susan Ayers
Affiliation:
University of Sussex
Andrew Baum
Affiliation:
University of Pittsburgh
Chris McManus
Affiliation:
St Mary's Hospital Medical School
Stanton Newman
Affiliation:
University College and Middlesex School of Medicine
Kenneth Wallston
Affiliation:
Vanderbilt University School of Nursing
John Weinman
Affiliation:
United Medical and Dental Schools of Guy's and St Thomas's
Robert West
Affiliation:
St George's Hospital Medical School, University of London
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Summary

Risky behaviours promote and healthy behaviours reduce disease risks

The evidence is clear: risky behaviours can lead to health crises and healthy behaviours can delay and avoid health crises. Cigarette smoking increases the probability of multiple types of cancer in addition to lung cancer, including cancers in organs as far from the mouth and lungs as the cervix. Cigarette smoking also greatly increases the likelihood of cardiovascular disease. Yet lung cancer has now exceeded breast cancer as a cause of death among women. Obesity is a risk factor for a broad range of diseases (Thompson & Wolf, 2001) and we are facing an epidemic of Type 2 diabetes, formally seen among the elderly and now increasingly diagnosed among teenagers (Mokdad et al., 2001). The epidemic is occurring in spite of the clear evidence that weight loss and exercise can reduce the risk of diabetes. A multi-centre trial with over 3000 participants, each of whom was at high risk for becoming diabetic, found that exercise and dietary changes resulted in a 58% reduction in the number of individuals becoming diabetic whilst medication resulted in a 31% reduction relative to a control group receiving placebo (Knowler et al., 2002). In short, despite knowledge of risk many people smoke, eat unhealthy, high fat, high calorie foods and are physically inactive. Knowledge of risk does not translate into risk avoidant behaviour (see also ‘Health related behaviours’).

Type
Chapter
Information
Cambridge Handbook of Psychology, Health and Medicine , pp. 124 - 128
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2007

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