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Prologue
Never a Moment’s Rest
Louisa Denby’s day began badly: She slept through her alarm
and had to skip breakfast to catch the bus to campus. Then, when
she went to the library to catch up on the reading she had to do
before taking a test the next day, the one article she needed
was missing. The librarian told her that replacing it would take
24 hours. Feeling frustrated, she walked to the computer lab to
print out the paper she had completed at home the night before.
The computer wouldn’t read her disk. She searched for
someone to help her, but she was unable to fi nd anyone who
knew any more about computers than she did.
It was only 9:42 a.m., and Louisa had a wracking headache.
Apart from that pain, she was conscious of only one feeling:
stress (Feldman, 2010).
Looking
Ahead
It’s not hard to understand why Louisa Denby was experiencing
stress. For people like her—and that probably includes most of
us—the intensity of juggling multiple roles leads to feelings of
never having suffi
cient time and, in some cases, takes a toll on
both physical and psychological well-being.
Stress and how we cope with it have long been central topics
of interest for psychologists. However, in recent years the focus
has broadened as psychology has come to view stress in the
broader context of one of psychology’s newer subfi elds: health
psychology.
Health psychology investigates the psychological
factors related to wellness and illness, including the prevention,
diagnosis, and treatment of medical problems. Health psycholo-
gists investigate the eff ects of psychological factors such as stress
on illness. They examine the psychological principles underlying
treatments for disease and illness. They also study prevention:
how healthier behavior can help people avoid and reduce health
problems such as stress and heart disease.
Health psychologists take a decisive stand on the enduring
mind–body issue that philosophers, and later psychologists, have
debated since the time of the ancient Greeks. In their view, the
mind and the body are clearly linked rather than representing
two distinct systems (Sternberg, 2000; Dalal & Misra, 2006).
Health psychologists recognize that good health and the
ability to cope with illness are aff ected by psychological factors
such as thoughts, emotions, and the ability to manage stress.
They have paid particular attention to the
immune system,
the
complex system of organs, glands, and cells that constitute our
bodies’ natural line of defense in fi ghting disease.
In fact, health psychologists are among the primary investi-
gators in a growing fi eld called
psychoneuroimmunology, or
PNI, the study of the relationship among psychological factors,
the immune system, and the brain. PNI has led to discoveries
such as the existence of an association between a person’s emo-
tional state and the success of the immune system in fi ghting
disease (Dickerson et al., 2004; Kemeny, 2007; Byrne-Davis &
Vedhara, 2008).
In sum, health psychologists view the mind and the body as
two parts of a whole human being that cannot be considered
independently. This more recent view marks a sharp departure
from earlier thinking. Previously, disease was seen as a purely
biological phenomenon, and psychological factors were of little
interest to most health-care workers. In the early 20th century,
the primary causes of death were short-term infections from
which one either rapidly recovered—or died. Now, however, the
major causes of death, such as heart disease, cancer, and diabetes,
are chronic illnesses that pose signifi cant psychological issues
because they often cannot be cured and may linger for years
(Bishop, 2005; Rotan & Ospina-Kammerer, 2007).
Advances in health psychology have had an impact across a
variety of disciplines and professions. For instance, health-care
professionals such as physicians and nurses, social workers,
dieticians, pharmacists, occupational therapists, and even clergy
are increasingly likely to receive training in health psychology.
In the three modules that follow, we discuss the ways in which
psychological factors aff ect health. We fi rst focus on the causes
and consequences of stress as well as on the means of coping
with it. Next, we explore the psychological aspects of several
major health problems, including heart disease, cancer, and
ailments resulting from smoking. Finally, we examine the ways
in which patient-physician interactions infl uence our health and
off er suggestions for increasing people’s compliance with
recommendations about behavior that will improve their
well-being.
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