Positive Health Behavior Change - Term Paper Example

Health Behavior Change Walking is an excellent means of improving a person’s fitness and shape up. While variant forms of physical activity are beneficial, walking exercise has a number of unique advantages. There is minimal equipment and this can be performed at the person’s own time of the day. In order to get the optimal health benefits, you should try to walk as briskly as you can for a duration of at least 30 minutes for most day of a week (Rollink 45). There are five steps that can help a person from increasing his speed from 3.5 mph in the first week in order to increase the speed to 4.5 mph in the third week. The initial step is a good base at the right pace. Once you start the program there is necessary need for increasing the number, length of those walking sessions and also the number of steps in the walk each day. Through the working session, you should start off by doing by ding about four 30 minutes session walking of brisk walking every week. After every week, each session will be extended by another five minutes. Two out of three sessions will provide you with an excellent base program for your health. With regards to the walking pace, the intensity of walking will differ according to age and fitness, but from a general perception, brisk is best (Rollink 67) A simplified way to work out how briskly you should walk is regarded as “talk test”. This involves holding a conversation while walking. This will help to determine the pace that should help you walk fast without overexertion. A more professional method of setting your walking pace is done by defining an individual “training zone” which is established on the heart rate speed. Counting the steps is a highly recommended step as it is commonly recommended that you accumulate 10,000 steps a day. An average stride length is about 80 cm which translates walking about 8km (Rollink 90). The easiest way to count the steps is through a pedometer; this is a gadget that is worn in the waist. Accelerating the speed from 3.5 to 4.5 mph you need to walk faster as it has a number of benefits as compared to a leisure roll. This helps to burn kilojoules and will engage more muscle in the movement which gives you a better workout through challenging your heart. One should take the doctor’s advice to prevent failures in the walking routine. The successes of this work out include increased fitness and increased muscle mass. The record that is kept is used follows the walking strategy. Keeping a trading diary or a journal will help n paying attention. You should analyze the effect the last session and see if you can improve the speed. It will simply take some time to recognize the little improvement on your daily exercise. This will increase motivation for exercise facilitating the improvement of 3.5 mph to 4.5 mph. You can always reward yourself once you reach your fitness goal. For example, if your aim is to walk for 30 minutes at a speed at 4.5 mph and you have worked to achieve this goal you can reward yourself. Rewards can range from getting a magazine membership or a full body massage. The Transtheoretical Model of Change was first explained by Prochaska and Diclemete 1983. This theory has been the basis for the development of effective uses that help to promote health behavior change. The Change theory is a model of intentional change as it focuses on the decision of making the individual. The core concepts of Transtheoretical Model of Change include the process of change, decisional balance, self efficacy and temptation. The processes of change are both covert and overt activities that are helpful through the stages of the walking program. The process includes consciousness raising, dramatic belief, environmental reevaluation and stimuli control. Decisional balance gives a person time to reflect by weighing out the process and the cons. Self efficacy will help in determining the situation in which a person can cope with high risk situation without relapsing into unhealthy state (Rollink 103). Temptation helps converse self efficacy. The stages of change that took place in the whole exercise routine include precontemplation, contemplation, preparation, action and maintenance. Precontempation is the stage that the individual thinks that he is not ready. The techniques in this stage validate lack or readiness and encourage self exploration but with no action. The second step is contemplation entails thinking of changing your stance about the whole program. The techniques in this stage include re –evaluation of individual image and encouraging evaluation of pros and cons. The third step is preparation which entails the readiness to change. This is the stage where one gets news experience with changes and also tries to change. This technique employs the use encouraging of small initial steps, the individual needs encouragement to change his behavior. The fifth stage is action which can also be used to make changes. This includes the active work in reaching the desired goal through behavior change including modification of the environment and experience. The techniques used help the individual on restructuring cues and social support. It will help to guard against the feeling of frustration and enhancing self efficacy through dealing with the obstacles at hand. Maintenance is the last stage as the participant is less tempted to relapse. He is confident to continue with the exercise program. The techniques include reinforce of internal rewards and creating a follow up support (Rollink 121). Despite the complexity of the model, the method is quite effective and the desired goal is reached. This model is helpful during exercise. There are various stages present in the change theory that are useful for selecting the various interventions. Identifying the position in the changing process will help in tailoring the intervention or planning for the future. The focus is not channeled to convince the patient in behavioral change but to help the patient move along the various stages of changes. By changing the framework of the stages of the Change model, I was able to shift the focus from grandiose which entails changing from unhealthy behavior to realistic ideas which help the patient to move from one stage to the next. The walking program should be carried close to home as this will make it more convenient. Setting the realistic goals will include walking three times a week for thirty minutes with a speed 3mph will help in achieving the desired goal of 4 mph. The motivation for this exercise is to lose weight and gain significant health benefits. One should start small as he progresses slowly by working towards a continuous bout of exercise and adding the minutes each and every practice session. If you start with a brief procedure you will adjust slowly. This will change their behavior through a directive of a physician. For the patient s in the precontemplation and contemplation stages, motivational techniques can be found effective in such circumstances. For the stages in change model, there are other options or changes that can be used through incorporating other explanatory or treatment models. For the precontemplation stage where the patient is not thinking about change , the other treatment model helping one to focus on the Health Belief Model which will help on focus of control. For the contemplation phase where weighing benefits and costs lead to proposed changes, motivational interviewing is imperative. For the preparation stage which entails experimenting minimal changes, the cognitive behavioral therapy is used. For the action phase which is responsible for taking a definitive action, the 12 step program of cognitive behavioral therapy (Rollink 140). The final stage which is maintenance helps in maintaining new behavior periodically, the other treatment method the 12 step cognitive behavioral therapy. Work cited Rollink, Stephen. Health Behavior Change: A Guide for Practitioners. New York : Churchill Livingstone, 2009. Print. Read More