Health Psychology Final Exam Guide

Final Exam Study Guide

• The final exam will be similar to the midterms focusing on material since the start of the semester.
• Expect approximately 10 short-answer/short essay questions and 50 multiple-choice questions.

Introduction (Health Psychology, Research Methods, Biopsychosocial Model)

• Health psychology examines illness patterns in the US, considering historical trends and the growth of the field.
• Historical illness theories and treatments are compared to modern approaches.
• A comparison and contrast of biomedical and biopsychosocial models are essential.
• The biopsychosocial model is preferred to the biomedical model by health psychologists.
• The scientific method is crucial to understand.
• Recognize that correlational studies cannot show cause and effect.

Biological Foundations

• Understand the nervous system's major divisions and their functions.
• Contrast the roles of sympathetic and parasympathetic autonomic nervous systems.
• Identify major endocrine glands and their functions.
• Explain the HPA axis's role in the body's stress response.

Stress and Coping

• Health psychologists define stress, and detail stressors, appraisals, and responses.
• The physiology of the fight-or-flight response will be tested, focusing on the brain and nervous system.
• The role of cortisol in the stress response will be assessed.
• Understand properties of stressors including threat type, duration, whether they are predictable or controllable.
• Understand the ideas of coping, problem-focused coping, emotion-focused coping.
• Differentiate approach-oriented and avoidance-oriented coping.
• Different types of social support and their effects are important to understand.
• The role of gratitude, humor, pets, and spirituality in coping is relevant.

Health Behaviors

• Understand the Health Belief Model, Theory of Planned Behavior, and Transtheoretical Model.
• Examples of behavior change approaches and strategies like self-monitoring, operant conditioning, and stimulus control.
• Understand gain and loss frames.
• Definitions of and distinctions between physical activity, exercise, and fitness need to be clear.
• Identify the characteristics and benefits of effective physical activity interventions.
• Understand sleep timing factors and sleep continuity.

Climate Change and Sustainability

• Explain how climate change is a health concern.
• Describe how psychological science can aid in understanding the inaction related to climate change.

Cardiovascular Disease

• Describe the structure and function of the cardiovascular system.
• Differentiate cardiovascular diseases and understand atherosclerosis.
• Identify risk factors, both controllable and uncontrollable.
• Examine the connection between Type A behavior, hostility, and cardiovascular disease.
• Understand the potential link between depression and cardiovascular disease.

Diabetes

• Differentiate the two forms of diabetes, focusing on underlying processes, symptoms, and risk factors.
• Understand the importance of self-management in diabetes treatment.
• Describe research on lifestyle changes for preventing diabetes.
• Importance of health psychology in diabetes care.

Cancer

• Describe the correlation between gender, race, ethnicity and Socioeconomic status (SES), to cancer.
• Identify behavioral risk factors for cancer.
• Understand how psychological factors impact cancer incidence, progression, and adjustment.
• Understand psychosocial interventions to cope with cancer.
• Factors affecting treatment and adherence.

Treatment and Adherence

• Factors influencing symptoms detection and interpretation in relation to health seeking behavior
• Understanding how representations influence reaction to symptoms.
• Discuss the effect of age, gender, socioeconomic status, culture, and ethnicity on symptom reporting.
• Identify the different stages of delay in seeking medical attention.
• Understand factors that promote adherence to recommendations.

Patient-Provider Relationships

• Describe the features of the doctor-patient relationship.
• Explain features that make it complicated, as compared with other relationships.
• Identify main goals in doctor-patient communication.
• Explain how to evaluate the quality of communication.
• How doctors might sometimes withhold information, and why
• Situations where patients may be dissatisfied or satisfied with their healthcare doctor.
• Explain what makes patients dissatisfied in a doctor-patient relationship.
• Understand how patients adhere to medication regimens and factors influencing patient adherence.
• Recognize how communication style can impact treatment.

Happiness

• Explore if happiness can improve health.
• Discuss how health psychologists measure happiness.
• Examine the relationship between happiness and factors like age, gender, race/ethnicity, physical appearance, and income.