Premium
Affiliation Goals and Health Behaviors
Author(s) -
Cullum Jerry,
O’Grady Megan A.,
Tennen Howard
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
social and personality psychology compass
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.699
H-Index - 53
ISSN - 1751-9004
DOI - 10.1111/j.1751-9004.2011.00376.x
Subject(s) - psychology , variety (cybernetics) , psychological intervention , social psychology , health behavior , health benefits , environmental health , medicine , psychiatry , artificial intelligence , computer science , traditional medicine
People are inherently driven by the need to form and maintain relationships, and these affiliation goals can influence health behaviors in two ways: (a) indirectly, by increasing a person’s attention to others and subsequently leaving them more likely to emulate the health behaviors of others (social contagion); (b) directly, by leading people to be more likely to engage in health behaviors they perceive as helping them to form and maintain relationships with others (self‐initiated behavioral engagement). In this review, we discuss the evidence for the catalyzing role of affiliation goals in these two processes for a variety of positive (e.g., exercising, smoking‐cessation) and detrimental (e.g., binge drinking and eating, needle sharing) health behaviors. We also discuss individual difference factors that may temporarily or chronically activate affiliation goals and ultimately influence health behaviors. Affiliation goals hold many implications for the study of health behavior, and for improving interventions.