Specific health behaviours have been identified to be positively associated with heath such as eating a healthy diet and maintaining a healthy body weight, exercising regularly, and some have been identified to be health risk behaviours e.g. smoking and drinking excessively (Housman and Dorman, 2005).
Health behaviour models examine why people participate in health behaviours. Odgen (2004) separates health behaviour models into two groups: 1. Social cognition models, which describe social behaviour in more general terms and normally as an outcome of subjective norms and attitudes to the specific behaviour. 2. Cognition models, which are specific health models, that ask more specifically why people adopt or do not adopt particular health related …show more content…
If communal norms are supportive and the perceived threat is great, no barriers stand between the individual and the execution of specific health behaviours. Especially some religious communities seem to be supportive of health behaviours. A meta-analyses by Chida, Steptoe and Powell (2009), of 91 studies showed that religiosity/ spirituality and including organizational activities, such as church attendance, was associated with reduced mortality in healthy population. Furthermore the analyses found a negative association between religiosity/ spirituality and cardiovascular mortality. It is suggested that this link exist due to the religions promotion of a healthy lifestyle. One strong example for this is the the town of Loma Linda, CA. The Seventh-Day Adventist church is the main religion of the town and actively promoting a vegan/vegeterian diet. This led to a reduced risk of cancer and a higher life expectancy (Manembu, 2016; Orlich et al., …show more content…
Countries of North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa, the Eastern Mediterranean region, and southern Asia and the Indian Ocean have the lowest level of consumption, areas that have a large population of the Islamic faith. Alcohol abstinence is often a virtue of this religion and law of many countries of these regions (WHO, 2011).
However, religious institutions can also hinder the practice of preventative health behaviours. The catholic church has been impediment of the promotion of condom use, leading to the spread of HIV in African countries. In Malawi 2004, the church lost 1% of its members due to death. The exact course for all of those death is not documented. However, 14% of all death in Malawi for this year was due to the the virus. It is suggested that many of the churches members died of AIDS as a result of not having have used
Health behaviour models examine why people participate in health behaviours. Odgen (2004) separates health behaviour models into two groups: 1. Social cognition models, which describe social behaviour in more general terms and normally as an outcome of subjective norms and attitudes to the specific behaviour. 2. Cognition models, which are specific health models, that ask more specifically why people adopt or do not adopt particular health related …show more content…
If communal norms are supportive and the perceived threat is great, no barriers stand between the individual and the execution of specific health behaviours. Especially some religious communities seem to be supportive of health behaviours. A meta-analyses by Chida, Steptoe and Powell (2009), of 91 studies showed that religiosity/ spirituality and including organizational activities, such as church attendance, was associated with reduced mortality in healthy population. Furthermore the analyses found a negative association between religiosity/ spirituality and cardiovascular mortality. It is suggested that this link exist due to the religions promotion of a healthy lifestyle. One strong example for this is the the town of Loma Linda, CA. The Seventh-Day Adventist church is the main religion of the town and actively promoting a vegan/vegeterian diet. This led to a reduced risk of cancer and a higher life expectancy (Manembu, 2016; Orlich et al., …show more content…
Countries of North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa, the Eastern Mediterranean region, and southern Asia and the Indian Ocean have the lowest level of consumption, areas that have a large population of the Islamic faith. Alcohol abstinence is often a virtue of this religion and law of many countries of these regions (WHO, 2011).
However, religious institutions can also hinder the practice of preventative health behaviours. The catholic church has been impediment of the promotion of condom use, leading to the spread of HIV in African countries. In Malawi 2004, the church lost 1% of its members due to death. The exact course for all of those death is not documented. However, 14% of all death in Malawi for this year was due to the the virus. It is suggested that many of the churches members died of AIDS as a result of not having have used