To Advance Population Health, We Need to Be "Well Behaved": The Science of Health Behaviour Change.

Abstract

As technological innovations continue to be developed and introduced within healthcare, public health, and our daily lives, human beings now have access to sophisticated and powerful tools that could be used in a variety of ways to change health behaviours. Information and communications technology (ICT) features prominently among 21st century innovations, and we must consider how they may be used to help or hinder our efforts to address population health challenges. There are numerous relevant challenges that need to be addressed within healthcare, public health, and other areas relevant to population health. The Australian population is aging (increasing in both the absolute number, and also proportion of older adults), along with having greater levels of obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, cancers, and other chronic diseases that will take a large toll on Australia. There are many lifestyle determinants of chronic disease that could potentially be addressed through ICT-based intervention efforts to improve diet, physical activity, alcohol, tobacco, sleep, and sexual behaviour. Challenges also include better delivery of what innovations or interventions have been shown to work, how we can best help those who need help the most, and how to implement policy, systems, or environmental interventions that can help to make healthy behaviours more convenient, attractive, and normative. As the name suggests, ICT involves any technology that allows us to store, retrieve, manipulate, transmit, or receive information electronically in a digital form. Although such technologies may allow us to reach more people than we could without them, and to do so in more rapid manner, with better geographic reach than ever before, ICT does not automatically provide any advantage in addressing the key drivers of health behaviour. Information itself could be useful-but is almost never sufficient-to facilitate health behaviour change; rather, information must instead be placed within the context of the key drivers of behaviour change. These drivers can be described most simply as factors that enhance people's capability, opportunity, and motivation to engage in health promoting behaviour, or their obverse, behaviours that undermine health. Beyond the storage, retrieval, manipulation, transmission, or receipt of information, we must ensure that key drivers of behaviour are built into ICT approaches. Understanding, predicting, and influencing human behaviour is crucially important if we aim to address relevant population health challenges, and to achieve better health and wellness within populations. In other words, if we want to be well, we need to be "well behaved." Illustrative examples will be shared from the author's research studies, primarily focused on motivating and building the capability of adult leaders to provide better opportunities for children to be physically active, eat healthfully, and to establish health promoting habits. These studies range from interventions set in girl scouts, schools, and whole communities, with a variety of ICT approaches.