Journal of Health Psychology

In a group of 330 participants from 147 different households, we examined the hypothesis that the importance of health concerns differs according to the kind of household task at hand and according to the position one takes in the household organization. Results show (1) that health concerns are generally more important than concern for other values; (2) that the importance of health concerns varies largely from one household task to another. Health is considered especially important in body care, nutrition and the organization of leisure time, but much less important in the domains of social contact, clothing and maintenance; (3) that the perceived importance of health differs according to the position one takes within the household, health being most important for household members with intermediate levels of responsibility. Results are interpreted as supporting the idea that health behaviour is partly regulated at a ‘supra-individual’ level of control.

Nine-year longitudinal data were used to group participants in terms of the stability of the boys’ disruptiveness and/or anxiety. In addition to annual assessment, 625 boys were interviewed between the ages 14 and 16 years to measure healthy and risky behaviours, as well as health outcomes. A logistic regression showed significant group effects for risky health behaviours (e.g. unsafe sex, alcohol abuse). Boys with stable disruptive characteristics were most likely and boys with stable anxious characteristics were least likely to engage in risky behaviours. As for health outcomes, boys with stable disruptive characteristics used health services more often. The boys with anxious characteristics reported more chronic minor health problems and were hospitalized more for non-psychiatric problems during the past year.

We examined the influence of stress, intimate support and marital status on postpartum depression among 189 African American and European American, inner-city women. We selected women in three common categories: (1) married, (2) cohabitating with partner, and (3) romantically involved, but not cohabitating. Women were interviewed on two occasions during pregnancy and seven to nine weeks following delivery. Women who were not married and did not live with their partner reported less intimacy with their partner and greater depression and increases in depression. Both marriage and cohabitation limited women’s depression level. Married women also increased in intimacy during their pregnancy, but cohabitating women did not. Results were independent of ethnic status, age and income. The importance of the findings given the rise in single parenthood was discussed.

This study examines possible relationships between perceived social support, physical and mental health, satisfaction towards hospital services, and satisfaction towards life-asa-whole, among the community elderly with chronic conditions. A sample of 172 Chinese elderly living in a metropolitan Taiwanese city were home-interviewed. Results indicated that (a) the elderly perceived good social support, and tangible support was the most important aspect; (b) the elderly did not perceive great impact of illness(es) upon their life, and both physical and mental health were satisfactory; (c) the elderly were generally satisfied with both the hospital services and life-as-a-whole; (d) apart from health and illness factors, social support appeared to have profound and pervasive protective effects on adjustment and satisfaction of the elderly.

The issue addressed in the study is: How do people perceive the combined effect of alcohol consumption and tobacco consumption on risks of cancer? The method used was an application of Information Integration Theory. Sixty-four participants of both sexes were asked to estimate the risk of cancer associated with a number of situations described by a tobacco-consumption level associated with an alcohol-consumption level. Participants were subsequently presented with a questionnaire concerning the way alcohol and tobacco consumption can cause cancer. Results showed that French adults apparently considered that indulging in only one of these two behaviours represents a maximum health risk. The two effects were seen to combine disjunctively which runs counter to current medical data. However, there was total contradiction between the participants’ answers to the questionnaire concerning their knowledge and the information integration task.

Measures of appearance motivation, obsessive-compulsive tendencies and tanning attitudes and behavior were completed by 175 adults, ages 16-65, who were approached while suntanning. Participants who scored high in both appearance motivation and obsessive-compulsive tendencies most strongly endorsed the importance of having a tan, spent the most time in the sun, were least likely to use sunscreen and were more likely to use tanning beds. In contrast, low-appearance motivation combined with high obsession- compulsion was associated with safe-sun practices.

This study demonstrates the substantial conceptual consequences in distinguishing a variable’s role as a moderator as opposed to a mediator. In particular, the study investigates the role of dietary restraint in the relationship between body dissatisfaction and psychological well-being. Path analyses showed that, in addition to its mediating role, dietary restraint has a moderating role, such that there is a stronger relationship between body dissatisfaction and psychological well-being when dietary restraint is high than when dietary restraint is low. In contrast, gender had only a direct effect on weight dissatisfaction. It was concluded that the same processes occur for both men and for women, whereby it is the individuals who diet who suffer loss of psychological well-being.

This laboratory experiment used random digit dialing procedures to recruit a community sample of physically inactive participants into a study that was designed to examine the impact of different intensities of acute aerobic exercise on feeling states. Sedentary men (n 5 36) and women (n 5 36) were randomly assigned to experience a single bout of aerobic exercise at one of three intensities (30%, 50%, 70% of HRR). Each participant attended two counterbalanced laboratory sessions, one involving an attention-control manipulation and the other involving aerobic exercise. Before and after each session, they completed a feeling state questionnaire. Data suggested that there were neither widespread mood-enhancing effects of acute exercise nor evidence for a strong dose-response relationship.

Psoriasis is a chronic, disabling skin disease affecting up to 2 percent of the population. Little is known about how physical, psychological and social features of the illness interact to create a negative impact. In this article, a biopsychosocial model of the impact of psoriasis is described, and results from a survey of 317 psoriasis patients are presented. The types of functional disability, psychological distress and disease-related stressors are described for highly strained patients (i.e. those with disease-related suicidal ideation) and compared with less strained patients (i.e. those without suicidal ideation). As predicted by the model, significantly more disability, psychological distress and disease-related stressors are found among highly strained patients. Logistical regression analysis revealed that strain is more strongly associated with disability, distress and disease-related stress level than with disease severity. Implications for research and clinical interventions are discussed.

The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore the experiences of three women breast-cancer survivors and the associated experiences of their partners. Individual in-depth interviews were conducted using a narrative approach, and the six accounts were analysed using the grounded theory method. The results describe the marked variation in the meaning of the experience among the participants, and the perceived change in each woman’s identity from prior to her cancer diagnosis to the time of the interview. The findings are presented in three sections: (1) Three Narrative Themes, the themes, Back to ‘Normal’, Rebirth and Turning Point, that represent the perceived change in each woman’s identity; (2) The Construction of Meaning, the shared characteristics that relate to meaning construction and identity; (3) Integration, the integration in each self-narrative of past and present self-understandings. The findings are compared with the existing literature, and the implications of different interpretations of self and change in the cancer experience are discussed. The limitations of the study are discussed with recommendations for future research.

Two experiments document one basis of patient stereotyping: the relative frequency of people’s contact with medical patients. Experiment 1 demonstrated that illusory correlations formed based on the infrequency of target patients and their non-cooperative behaviors. Participants read about two groups of patients with two similar diseases (labelled A and B). One group appeared less often than the other and performed fewer non-cooperative behaviors; however, the proportion of non-cooperative and cooperative behaviors was the same for both groups. Participants overestimated the number of non-cooperative behaviors performed by the infrequently appearing group, evaluated the group negatively and believed that these patients would be unlikely to cooperate in the future. Experiment 2 attempted to address the relationship between illusory correlations and memory for the infrequent group’s non-cooperative behaviors. Implications for how people perceive medical non-adherence in patients with stigmatized medical conditions were discussed.