This document provides an overview of health psychology. It defines health psychology and identifies determinants of health behaviors such as diet, physical activity, smoking, alcohol consumption, drug use, sexual behaviors, and risk taking. It also discusses how locus of control and attribution styles can influence psychological health, with an internal locus of control and optimistic attribution style acting as protective factors.

1. Health psychology
Presented by Sara Maryam and Rimsha Waseem

2. Objectives
• At the end of this unit learners will be able to:
• Identify the determinants of health related
behaviours.
• Develop understanding about the role of locus of
control and attribution styles in serving as
protective measures for psychological health.

3. Health
• Health is a state of complete physical, mental and
social well-being and not merely the absence of
disease or infirmity.

4. Do u know what is psychology?

5. Health Psychology
• Health psychology is the aggregate of the specific
educational, scientific and professional contributions of
the discipline of psychology to the promotion and
maintenance of health, the prevention and treatment
of illness, and the identification of etiologic and
diagnostic correlates of health, illness and related
dysfunction.
• Matarazzo (1980) p.815

6. Determinants of people health
Determinants of health are the factors that influence
health status of individuals or populations.

7. Behavioural determinants
• The behavioural determinants are given below:
1. Tobacco smoking
2. Alcohol consumption
3. Drug use
4. Physical activity
5. Dietary behaviour

8. Conti
6 Sexual behaviour
7.Vaccination status
8. Risk taking behaviour

9. Explanation
• Dietary behaviour: Consuming a
healthy diet and having access to a nutritious
supply of food are important to good health ,as
good nutrition is a key factor in the overall health
and wellbeing of women and men.

10. Physical Activity
• The importance of being physically active,as regular
physical activity contributes tend to outlive people
who are physically inactive women and men.
• " If exercise could be packaged into a pill, It would
be the single most widely prescribed and benefical
medicine in the nation".

11. Smoking and Alcohol
• Smoking is major contributing factor to poor health and is linked
to many forms of illness including cancer.
• Alcohol Consumption Drinking excessive amounts of alcohol
contributes to:
• Liver disease or cancer of the liver
• Increased road accidents -Brain damage associated with loss or
long and short term memory
• Obesity

12. Drug Abuse
• The abuse of drugs can increase the risk of developing:
• Metal illness
• Brain damage
• Birth defects
• Accidents
• HIV and hepatitis (sharing needles)

13. Sexual behaviour
• Unsafe sexual practices can contribute to a
variation in health status:
• Increasing the risk of contracting an STI
• Increasing the rate of unwanted pregnancy

14. Risk taking behaviours
• Risk taking behaviours can result in both positive and
negative health outcomes such as:
• Accidents leading to death
• Accidents leading to injuries and long term disability
• Violence leading to injury, disability and death

15. 2nd Objective
• Develop understanding about the role of locus of
control and attribution styles in serving as
protective measures for psychological health .

16. • LOCUS OF CONTROL
• With in psychology , locus of control is considered to be
an important aspect of personality .The concept was
developed originally Julian rotter in the 1950s
• Locus of control refer to an individuals perception about
the underlying main causes of events in hisher life.

18. • There are two types of locus of control .
• Internal locus of control
• External locus of control

19. • I control the consequences of my behavior.
• Individual believes that hisher behavior is guided
by hisher personal decisions and effect.

20. • The consequences of my behavior are outside my
control
• Individual believes that hisher behavior is guided
by fate , luck or other circumstances.

21. • Better academic achievement.
• Better interpersonal relations.
• Greater efforts to learn.
• Positive attitude to exercise.
• Lower cigarette smoking.
• Lower hypertension and heart attacks.

22. • More resigned to conditions ‘as they are’.
• Lower effort to deal with health .
• Lower level of psych adjustment
• BUT
• IN NONRESPONSIVE ENVIROMENT
• Greater sense of satisfaction.

23. • There are three style of attribution .
• Optimistic
• Pessimistic
• Hostile

24. • Biased toward internal (often stable ) attribution for
positive outcome ,external (often unstable)for
negative .
• e.g
• attribute successful diagnoses to personal
ability ,and misdiagnoses to inadequate information
from patient.

25. • Biased toward internal ( often stable) attribution for
negative outcome , external ( often unstable) for
positive.
• e.g
• attribute successful outcome to good luck ; poor
outcomes are due to lack of personal ability

26. • Biased toward external stable attribution for
negative outcome.
• e.g
• attribution most workplace problems to a
biased and vengeful manager.

27. • Furnham, A. (2009). Locus of control and attribution
style. Handbook of individual differences in social
behavior, 274-287.
• Nestler, E. J., Alreja, M., & Aghajanian, G. K. (1999).
Molecular control of locus coeruleus
neurotransmission. Biological psychiatry, 46(9), 1131-
1139.