Making changes to your health behaviour

Health related habits develop early in life, and therefore are engrained by adulthood. Therefore, being able to recognise the need to change behaviours and mastering behaviour change is critical for our health and quality of life.

Often behaviour changes relapses after the first few weeks, months, years or days! Successful behaviour changes need to be maintained, and this takes considerable time and effort.

Stages of change cycle (adapted from Prochaska and DiClemente 1982), graphics courtesy of the DESMOND Programme (2008).

The following stages of behaviour change were identified by psychologists:

Avoiding

This stage is characterised by someone having no intention to change in the next 6 months. They are either unaware that their behaviour is a problem or do not want to change. Approximately half the population is in this stage at any
one time.

Thinking
Someone in this stage is thinking about changing within the next six months. They are able to think about and discuss their behaviour, however they will not have made the decision to start making changes yet.

Preparation/Planning
Someone in this stage is looking to change in the immediate future (usually within the next month). It is important to have an action plan which is SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and have a Timescale).

Starting
Someone has made a change to a behaviour, but this change is not yet well-established. They will still be battling with old habits and it takes effort to persevere with the change made. At any one moment this stage applies to only a quarter of the population.

Keeping it going
After a few months the ‘new’ habit becomes the norm. A behaviour change that has been started within the last six months is viewed as maintenance.

Relapse
This can happen many times while someone is trying to make a behaviour change. It is seen as a temporary lapse back to the old behaviour, but the person may then go straight back into any of the other stages. People often go around the cycle many times before their behaviour change becomes permanent.