Are diet-specific compensatory health beliefs predictive of dieting intentions and behaviour?
Compensatory Health Beliefs (CHBs) - beliefs that an unhealthy behaviour can be compensated for by healthy behaviour - are hypothesised to be activated automatically to help people resolve conflicts between their desires (e.g. eat chocolate) and their long-term goals (e.g. dieting). The aim of the present research was to investigate diet-specific CHBs within the context of a theoretical framework, the Health Action Process Approach (HAPA), to examine the extent to which diet-specific CHBs contribute to dieting intentions and dietary intake. Seventy-five dieting women were recruited in Switzerland and England and were asked to complete measures of diet-specific CHBs, risk perception, outcome expectancies, self-efficacy, intention, and behaviour. Path modelling showed that, overall, diet-specific CHBs were not related to dieting intentions (β=.10) or behaviour (β=.06) over and above variables specified in the HAPA. However, risk perception moderated the relationship between diet-specific CHBs and intention (β=.26). Diet-specific CHBs positively predicted intention in women with high risk perception, but not in women with low risk perception. This positive relationship might be explained by the assumption that CHBs play different roles at different stages of the health-behaviour change process. Future studies should further examine moderators and stage-specific differences of the associations between CHBs, intention and health-behaviour change.
Department of Psychology, Developmental and Health Psychology, University of Konstanz, PO Box 14, 78457 Konstanz, Germany. Electronic address: Theda.Radtke@uni-konstanz.de.
Theda
T
Radtke
Department of Psychology, Sociology & Politics, Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield S10 2BP, United Kingdom.
Daphne
D
Kaklamanou
Department of Psychology, Applied Social Psychology, University of Zurich, Binzmühlestrasse 14/14, 8050 Zurich, Switzerland.
Urte
U
Scholz
Department of Psychology, Social and Health Psychology, University of Zurich, Binzmühlestrasse 14/14, 8050 Zurich, Switzerland.
Rainer
R
Hornung
Manchester Centre for Health Psychology, School of Psychological Sciences, University of Manchester, Coupland Street, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL, United Kingdom.
Christopher J
CJ
Armitage
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D004032:Diet; D004739:England; D005247:Feeding Behavior; D005260:Female; D015438:Health Behavior; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006801:Humans; D033182:Intention; D008875:Middle Aged; D009042:Motivation; D020377:Self Efficacy; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013557:Switzerland; D055815:Young Adult
Compensatory Health Beliefs; Dieting; England; Health Action Process Approach; Intention; Switzerland