Health Behavior Change: Moving from Observation to Intervention

Abstract

How can progress in research on health behavior change be accelerated? Experimental medicine (EM) offers an approach that can help investigators specify the research questions that need to be addressed and the evidence needed to test those questions. Whereas current research draws predominantly on multiple overlapping theories resting largely on correlational evidence, the EM approach emphasizes experimental tests of targets or mechanisms of change and programmatic research on which targets change health behaviors and which techniques change those targets. There is evidence that engaging particular targets promotes behavior change; however, systematic studies are needed to identify and validate targets and to discover when and how targets are best engaged. The EM approach promises progress in answering the key question that will enable the science of health behavior change to improve public health: What strategies are effective in promoting behavior change, for whom, and under what circumstances?

Self‐control and health‐related behaviour: The role of implicit self‐control, trait self‐control, and lay beliefs in self‐control

“…As a consequence, government health departments and health advocacy organizations have called for the development of behavioural interventions to curb the insidious human and economic costs of chronic disease (OSBBR, 2016). Behavioural interventions targeting change in behaviour at the individual level necessitate the identification of the key modifiable determinants of healthpromoting behaviours (Sheeran, Klein, & Rothman, 2017). Identification of the determinants is necessary to flag the key targets for behavioural interventions and the development of interventions with the highest probability of successful health behaviour change (Kok et al, 2016).…”

Promoting Social Nurturance and Positive Social Environments to Reduce Obesity in High-Risk Youth

“…However, such studies tend to be multi-faceted, and, as a result, are not designed to allow for strong tests of the critical components or underlying mechanisms that drive weight loss (for further discussion of this issue see Sheeran, Klein, & Rothman, 2017). Thus, while the selected trials provide general support for the importance of constructs derived from FST, SCT, and SDT (i.e., positive parenting skills, autonomy support, and behavioral skills training), it is difficult to draw empirically-supported conclusions about best practices given the lack of mediational analyses supporting these linkages in intervention trials.…”

Milieu matters: Evidence that ongoing lifestyle activities influence health behaviors

“…Moreover, cluster analysis can be applied to data from the network in order to empirically identify subgroups of interest; these subgroups can then be compared in terms of their predictor-outcome relations. Thus, neural network analysis could prove a valuable strategy for identifying what variables are important for whom and so inform the design of future behavior change interventions [55]. …”