Consideration of future consequences and self-control mediate the impact of time perspectives on self-rated health and engagement in healthy lifestyles among young adults

Abstract

The study investigated how different time perspectives predict people’s self-rated health and engagement in healthy lifestyles, and explored the mediating effects of consideration of future consequences (CFC) and self-control as the underlying mechanisms. Young adults (n = 299, M age = 23.65, ranges from 18 to 30 years old) completed measures of time perspectives, CFC, self-control and engagement in daily health behaviors. Generalized linear regression models showed that Past-Negative time perspective negatively predicted sleep quality; Future time perspective negatively predicted unhealthy eating patterns; Future time perspective was the only protective factor of risky drinking, while both Past-Positive and Future time perspective were protective factors of smoking. Mediation analyses showed that CFC-Immediate and self-control mediated the relationship between Future time perspective and eating patterns. Results suggested that consideration of future consequences and self-control partially explained how time perspectives affect engagement in healthy lifestyles among young Chinese adults. Implications of the current research for promoting healthy living and directions for future research are discussed. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12144-022-03135-6.

How is Patient Adherence Possible? A Novel Mechanistic Model of Adherence Based on Humanities

“… 34 It also corresponds to the concept of consideration of future consequences, 35 which has an impact on the achievement of healthy behaviors. 36 It may to some extent be innate, that is, genetically determined, 37 or influenced by the social context. It may also represent the capacity for delayed gratification that Walter Mischel showed in his marshmallow test in 4-year-old children (managing not to eat a marshmallow for 20 minutes when they have been told that if they succeed they will get two) to be related to the ability to accomplish long-term projects, 38 although Mischel’s seminal article describing the delayed gratification test has recently been the subject of controversy.…”

The conflicting effects of self-construal on impulsive buying tendency toward unhealthy food: the moderating role of future time perspective

“…The current literature has confirmed the role of future time perspectives in explaining different consumer behaviours and outcomes (Kooij, Kanfer, Betts, & Rudolph, 2018). In the food domain, the future time perspective has been adopted to explain food choice or health decisions in the form of consideration of future consequences (CFC; Joireman et al, 2012;Strathman et al, 1994), and the findings have validated the important role of CFC as a predictor of those choices (Borisenkov et al, 2022;Guo et al, 2022). For example, CFC fosters healthimproved food choices, such as health-associated cookies, attention to unhealthy food warnings, and decreased discretionary salt usage (Antunez et al, 2022;Rojas-Rivas et al, 2020;Tortora & Ares, 2018).…”

“…Despite a growing interest in research on what triggers impulsive buying of different goods and services (Amos et al, 2014;Iyer et al, 2019), the individual mechanism underlying the impulsive process of consuming unhealthy foods is still unclear (Duarte et al, 2013;Honkanen et al, 2012;Onwezen et al, 2016;Veling et al, 2013). However, research in the food domain has demonstrated increased interest in the role of stable individual traits (Köster, 2009;Machado-Oliveira et al, 2020), self-view (Zhang & Shrum, 2009;Zhang et al, 2010), temporal dilemmas between living for the present and considering future consequences of one's behaviour (Arnocky et al, 2013;Guo et al, 2022;Murphy & Dockray, 2018), or a combination of personality traits, values, and temporal conflicts (Nystrand et al, 2021;Olsen & Tuu, 2021) in explaining unhealthy food-related behaviours. One particular interest is research on whether and how self-construal can offer a valuable framework for explaining psychological conflicts in food choice (Banovic & Barone, 2021;Wang et al, 2020), for example, exploring conflicts if and how individuals view themselves in their social environment, as self-construal or seeing the self with others (Bakir et al, 2020;Cross et al, 2011;Markus & Kitayama, 1991;Ronteltap et al, 2012).…”

Impact of Food Safety and Nutrition Knowledge on the Lifestyle of Young Poles—The Case of the Lublin Region

“…Adolescents like to show off in front of their peers and engage in risky behavior while negating everything adults say. This is all the more "cool" because the health consequences of risky eating behaviors are not revealed until many years later, and a person does not notice the connection, for example, between eating excessive amounts of unhealthy food in youth and a disease that "gets him" in adulthood [9]. The authors of [8] showed that adolescents are a group that is not very receptive to health education that would reduce the risk of many lifestyle diseases in adulthood.…”

“…One possible reason for the low commitment to a healthy lifestyle among students is that it will be several years before making an immediate and significant effort, for example, giving up eating junk food, will yield visible effects, such as maintaining a healthy body weight and preventing chronic diseases in adulthood [9,22]. Many studies have confirmed that time perspective strongly influences starting or maintaining healthy lifestyles, such as physical activity, adhering to a healthy diet [26], or avoiding addictions [27].…”