Taylor Lott

Joel Williams
Health 2400 001
April 24, 2014
Critical Reflection
The purpose of Health 2400-Determinants of Health Behavior is to analyze certain health
behaviors based on psychological, social, cultural, and environmental factors (IROAR). This
course also introduces health behavior theories (IROAR) to aid in the understanding of why
people act out particular health behaviors. Health 2400 helped me to understand the
determinants of many health behaviors, highlight the target groups at risk for the behavior, and
develop prevention strategies and interventions to help individuals cease the negative health
behaviors. The subject matter of this course will help aid me in my future career in the health
field. I hope to be able to use the knowledge I have taken from this class to target certain
dangerous or negative health behaviors and aid in their cessation.
One aspect of this course I think was extremely pertinent to not just aiding in my
profession, but also in aspects of my personal life, was the make-up of the social ecological
model. This model shows intrapersonal factors, interpersonal factors, organization and
community influences, as well as public policies that have an influence on the behaviors of the
individual. Because this model focuses on the different levels of internal and external forces that
impact the behavior, a broader explanation of how or why the behavior is being enabled or how
the behavior can be prevented. The model also gives a great visual that helped me to be able to
remember the different levels of factors and I was able to understand and apply this model for
my final paper. I thought the social ecological model was one of the best models to use due to

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the fact that it showed the varying influences on behavior. This could also be seen as a negative
though because of all the varying aspects; the model is not extremely focused on one level over
the other.
Another aspect of the Health 2400 class that I thought was tremendously important was
the predisposing, enabling, and reinforcing factors. The predisposing factors hone in on the
values, knowledge, beliefs and attitudes that motivate the individual to perform the particular
health behavior. The enabling factors are more of the barriers or access to the actual behavior.
Reinforcing behaviors are the rewards received and the feedback the learner receives from other
following adoption of the behavior (Green & Kreuter, 1999). These factors are pertinent to
understanding how and why people participate in negative health behaviors. I used these factors
to help me in understanding what the motivations were for my health behavior and how college
students were able to get access to ADHD stimulants; these factors also helped me to plan my
intervention strategy for my final paper. These factors are some of the higher-priority factors
in comprehending many health behaviors.
The transtheoretical model is another health behavior topic I found to be pertinent to my
understanding of health behaviors. The transtheoretical model aided in me being able to
comprehend the mindset of individuals from before they decide to change their behavior to after
the behavior change and the maintenance of that behavior. The stages of change constructs for
this model not only explains the process of changing a health behavior, but using these steps can
help non-health professionals find an easy straightforward way to help people they know change
a negative health behavior. I found this model, particularly the stages of change constructs, to be
a simple, but also effective way for anybody to be able to change a negative health behavior. I

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think using this model for many interventions will help decrease the statistics on many health
behaviors.
Throughout this course, I have learned an enormous amount of material that has really
allowed for me to grow in my studies and better comprehend the reasons why people participate
in harmful health behaviors. I feel as though this class has really allowed me to learn more about
the different mindsets of individuals and how to apply models, constructs, and theories to create
interventions to target health behaviors that have caused the health of the United States as a
whole to decline tremendously. I believe the skills and knowledge I take from this course will
help me in my career to give tips to people struggling to change health behaviors. I have learned
so many different things and I really enjoyed this class. The negative health behaviors in this
country are constantly increasing in numbers and I think I could help to alleviate this issue by
using the tools I learned in this class to better the health status for this country in the future.

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Works Cited
Green, L. W. and Kreuter, M. W. (1999). Predisposing, enabling, and reinforcing factors.
Health Promotion Planning: An Educational and Ecological Approach. 41.
IROAR (school registration site)