Health Behavior and Health Education, Fourth Edition

PART ONE: HEALTH EDUCATION AND HEALTH BEHAVIOR: THE FOUNDATIONS ONE: THE SCOPE OF HEALTH BEHAVIOR AND HEALTH EDUCATION KEY POINTS This chapter will  Discuss the importance of developing successful strategies to improve health behavior.  Summarize the leading causes of death and disease burden in the United States and globally.  Describe the scope and evolution of health education.  Provide key definitions of health education, health behavior, and health promotion.  Discuss the diverse settings and audiences for health education.  Highlight progress and challenges in health behavior and health education research. CHAPTER SUMMARY This chapter discusses the dynamic nature of health education and health behavior today in the context of changing patterns of disease and trends in health care, health education, and disease prevention in the United States and globally. It provides definitions of health education, health promotion, and health behavior and describes the broad and diverse parameters of this maturing field. Health behavior research has experienced great progress, but mixed findings raise new questions and pose methodological, theoretical, and substantive challenges. The interrelationships and importance of theory, research, and practice are set against a backdrop of the important, growing, and complex challenges in health education and health behavior. KEY TERMS Health education Health behavior Health promotion Ecological perspective Multiple levels of influence Reciprocal causation Preventive health behavior Illness behavior Sick-role behavior DISCUSSION QUESTIONS 1. As the health promotion specialties and the varieties of intervention settings increase, which topic or setting do you see as the most important to your training, and why? 2. Which type of communication technology do you see as having the best potential for influencing individual health behavior such as quitting smoking? Explain your vision of how this technology could make a difference now, and in 10 years. 3. As the research literature grows, identify the research literature you are aware of. Where might you go if you were looking for existing research on a specific health behavior topic, for example how to increase use of influenza immunizations? How would you focus your search? On the behavior? The target audience? The disease? What else? TEST BANK T/F 1. The demands on health education and health behavior are decreasing as strategies and evidence increase. TRUE FALSE 2. Interventions at multiple levels are needed to initiate and sustain behavior change. TRUE FALSE 3. Health promotion draws much of its theoretical perspectives, research , and practice tools from a variety of disciplines. TRUE FALSE 4. Sustained health behavior change is based on individual lifestyle choices. TRUE FALSE 5. For health education to be effective, it should be designed with an understanding of the recipients’ beliefs, attitudes, values, and skills. TRUE FALSE M/C 6. What makes it possible to track trends in risk factors, health behaviors, and healthy environments? a. Theories b. Data systems c. Interdisciplinary research d. Interactive communication technologies