Self-Efficacy

Albert Bandura

The recent years have witnessed a change in the health field from a disease model to a health model. It is just as meaningful to speak of levels of vitality and healthfulness as of degrees of impairment and debility. Viewed from this perspective, health is measured not only in terms of life span and mortality and disability rates but in years of healthy life. The quality of health is heavily influenced by lifestyle habits. By exercising control over several health habits, people can live longer and healthier, and slow the process of aging. The structuring of health promotion should begin with goals, not means. If health is the goal, psychosocial approaches provide an important means to it. This entry analyzes the application of social cognitive theory to health promotion and disease prevention (Bandura, 1997). This theory identifies a core set of determinants, specifies the mechanism through which they produce their ...

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