Health Psychology

Abstract

Psychology focuses on what people believe and how they behave; health psychology explores how these beliefs and behaviours relate to health and illness. This chapter focuses on the beliefs that individuals have about health and illness and how these beliefs relate to their health behaviours and subsequently their health status. Part 1 explores the contribution of psychology to studying health and illness, describing the background to psychology and highlighting the importance of beliefs concerning health and illness on the part of laypeople and health professionals. Pain is used as an example of the role of psychology in the experience of illness. Part 2 describes the models that have been developed within health psychology, in particular focusing on the structured models of health beliefs and the self-regulatory model of illness behaviour. Finally, the case study on diet, eating habits and obesity explores in depth how psychological theories can be applied to a topical health issue.