Toward a model of illness behavior.

Abstract

means that human groups are more or less regularly confronted with decremental changes in human functioning which we assume are to some extent socially patterned. This in turn suggests that it may be possible to depict in an abstract way fundamental behavioral changes associated with an occurrence of disease. A first step in this direction would be the construction of an analytical model which accounts for the decisions that are made by a person during the time that he is ill. We could term this a model of behavior. The purpose of this paper is to put forth, in a preliminary fashion, an admittedly theoretical model of this decision-making process. The model to be discussed does not presume to describe the actual way in which persons make decisions during illness, but rather to offer an abstract account of how such decisions may be viewed or explained. In general, in the discussion that follows the term disease is used when reference is made to states that are biologically altered (i.e., chemical, physiological) and the term illness when speaking of the complex but socially defined state that forms the bases of decisions about medical treatment.