Content
Discussion
Common Elements
of Individual Change Theories
By now you may
have realized that theories explaining individual behaviour change
share a number of common elements. One example of a user-friendly
framework integrating these theories was developed at a consensus
conference of prominent behavioural scientists (Fishbein et al.,
1991).
The scientists
identified eight conditions, one or more of which must be true in
order for a person to make a successful health-related behaviour
change:
 a
strong, positive intention to perform the behaviour
an absence of environmental
barriers preventing the behaviour
skills to perform
the behaviour
advantages of performing
the behaviour outweigh the disadvantages
social pressure to
perform the behaviour
consistency between
the behaviour and a person’s self image
a more positive than
negative emotional reaction to performing the behaviour
perceived self-efficacy
(or confidence) to perform the behaviour
To make this
framework more practical, Thesenvitz (2000) briefly explained each
condition, provided some strategies for meeting each condition,
and gave examples illustrating the application of these strategies.
Please refer to her article
if you are interested in finding out more about this synthesis of
individual behaviour theories.
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