This volume describes classic and contemporary theory and research in social psychology that sheds light on how people think about health and illness, as well as their willingness to engage in health-relevant behaviors. The Editors have selected papers that serve to illustrate the reciprocal relation between advances in theory and advances in practice.
The first two sections of the volume examine people''s mental representations of health and health practices, and how these personal construals and implicit theories are linked to behavior. People can react to new health information in different ways - with acceptance, defensiveness, or downright ignorance. Research that can help us to understand these varied reactions is examined in Section 3. The following sections consider how classic social psychological theories and perspectives can be used to understand behavior relevant to health and illness. These include social influence, social comparison, pluralistic ignorance, socia
