This book is a balanced, well-grounded and comprehensive European textbook with sufficient breadth of material to introduce students, yet ensuring research depth to benefit graduate students as well as those undertaking health psychology projects. In addition to presenting traditional health psychology topics such as beliefs about health and illness, behaviors and outcomes, topics such as socioeconomic influences on health, biological basis, individual and cultural differences, and psychological interventions in health, illness, and health care are also included, as they are all from essential in the study of health psychology.
The chapters in the book are organized as follows: first the problems, then the theory, third the research evidence, and finally - the application of the theory and (where relevant) the effectiveness of interventions. It first examines the factors that contribute to health, including societal and behavioral factors, and how psychologists and other professionals can improve or maintain people's health. It then examines the process of illness: the physiological systems that may fail in illness, the psychological factors that may contribute to the development of illness, how we deal with illness, and how the medical system deals with us when we become ill. Finally, we explore a number of psychological interventions that can improve the well-being, and perhaps even the health, of those with health problems.
