Lesson 3 Health Risks Your Behavior Warm up

Lesson 3: Health Risks & Your Behavior

Warm up • List some healthful behaviors you already practice. What healthful behaviors would you like to add to your life?

Behaviors • Behavior – The way you act or choose to act in a situation. – Behaviors can be healthful, or they can put you or others at risk. – They can be learned and become habit. • Healthful behaviors – Behaviors that promote health, prevent injury and premature death, and improve the quality of the environment. – It is more beneficial to your health status to learn and practice healthful behaviors.

Identifying Health Risks • Every day you are faced with some degree of risk. – Simple events such as crossing a street or using electrical appliances, carry a degree of risk. • Risk behaviors – actions that can potentially threaten your health or the health of others. • It is important to recognize that you can control most risk behaviors. • By understanding the risks associated with certain behaviors, you can make safe and responsible decisions about which risks to avoid.

Recognizing Risk Behaviors • The Center for Disease Control (CDC) has identified six risk behaviors that account for most of the deaths and disability among young people under age 24. • These risk factors can lead to heart disease, cancer, and other serious illnesses later in life: – Tobacco use – Unhealthy dietary behaviors – Inadequate physical activity – Alcohol and other drug use – Sexual behaviors that may result in STD’s and unintended pregnancies – Behaviors that contribute to unintentional injuries and violence.

Risks and Consequences • Risk behaviors carry significant consequences. Both the short-term and long-term consequences can harm your health. • Before you engage in risk behaviors, it’s important to evaluate the consequences. – For example, smoking can have immediate health consequences, such as bad breath, yellow teeth, and headaches. The long-term consequences of smoking can include lung cancer, emphysema, and heart disease. • Risks can add up over time. Cumulative risks are related risks that increase in effect with each added risk. – For example, eating an occasional high-fat meal at a fast food restaurant probably won’t permanently affect your overall health. However, if you regularly eat high-fat meals, the negative affects accumulate and could lead to serious health problems.

Risks & Consequences • Cumulative risks also increase when several risk factors are combined. • For example, using a cell phone while driving carries risks. So does speeding. If an individual engages in both of these risk behaviors, the chance of getting into a car accident becomes even greater.

How to Avoid or Reduce Risks • You can take action to reduce your exposure to health risks. • You can reduce health risks through prevention: – Taking steps to keep something from happening or getting worse. – For example, getting regular medical exams and dental checkups.

How to Avoid or Reduce Risks • You can also reduce health risks through abstinence: – A deliberate decision to avoid high-risk behaviors, including sexual activity and the use of tobacco, alcohol and other drugs. • All areas of your health triangle benefit when you prevent and abstain from high risk behaviors. – You protect yourself from injury and chronic diseases, you feel good about yourself, which strengthens your mental/emotional health and social relationships.

Top Ten Teen Risk Behaviors Ø Alcohol Ø Eating Disorders Ø Tobacco Ø Drug Abuse Ø STD’s Ø Teen Pregnancy Ø Obesity Ø Anemia Ø Depression Ø Diabetes

WAKE UP

Where do you stand in terms of your healthful behavior? • Health Behavior Inventory – Each of you will assess your present health status in 10 categories described by current research. – Because the assessment is 100 questions, it is fairly accurate. The more elements an assessment has the more accurate it is likely to be. – The most comprehensive medical evaluations include 600 or more questions. – This health appraisal uses several questions from other appraisals and simplifies them.

Total Health Assessments 1. Take your time and be honest. 2. At the end of each section you should tally your score in that particular section. 3. At the end of the assessment, create a bar graph and graph your scores. • The idea behind the graph is to see whether any area of your health is greatly out of alignment with the others. • Balance in all areas of health is the ultimate goal. 4. After you finish assessment and graph, write your two highest scores and your two lowest scores on the board so that we can get a general appraisal of the health of the class.

Total Health Assessment Graph Example

Health Behavior Contract • A written plan that a person makes to develop the habit of practicing a specific healthful behavior. 5 steps to follow: 1. Write your name and the date. 2. Write the healthful behavior you want to practice as a health goal. 3. Write specific statements that describe how the healthful behavior reduces health risks. 4. Make a specific plan for recording your progress. 5. Complete the evaluation of how the plan helped you accomplish the health goal.

Reminder – REMINDER: Random binder checks; make sure your binder is organized!! – Turn in syllabus if you have not already done so!