Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Health Behavior Change: A Contextually-Driven Approach

Frontiers in Psychology

Pak-Kwong Chung¹  Chun-Qing Zhang¹  Patrick Smith²  Steven C. Hayes²  Emily Leeming²  Martin S. Hagger³ 

[1] Department of Physical Education, Hong Kong Baptist University, Kowloon, Hong Kong;Department of Psychology, University of Nevada, Reno, Reno, NV, United States;Department of Sport Sciences, University of Jyväskylä, Jyväskylä, Finland;School of Psychology and Speech Pathology, Faculty of Health Sciences, Curtin University, Bentley, WA, Australia;

关键词: ACT;    behavior change;    behavior maintenance;    psychological flexibility;    relational frame theory;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpsyg.2017.02350

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

Promoting health behavior change presents an important challenge to theory and research in the field of health psychology. In this paper, we introduce a context-driven approach, the Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) model which is built on Relational Frame Theory. The ACT-based intervention aims to promote individuals’ new health behavior patterns through the improvement of the key construct of psychological flexibility, which is defined as the ability to contact the present moment more fully with acceptance and mindfulness as a conscious human being. Building on the psychological flexibility model, implemented through the six core ACT processes, individuals improve maintenance of long term health behavior change through committed acts in service of chosen values while acknowledging and accepting the existence of contrary thoughts, rules, and emotions as part of themselves but not determinant of their behaviors. Taking advantage of this context-driven approach of health behavior change, we recommend researchers and practitioners to design their health behavior change intervention programs based on ACT.

【 授权许可】

Unknown