Smoking cessation and stress management: Applications of the transtheoretical model of behavior change

At the beginning of the new century, the focus of medicine and public health is shifting to the prevention and treatment of chronic diseases. A unique characteristic of chronic diseases is the importance of human behavior. The cessation of unhealthy patterns of behavior and the acquisition of healthy patterns are critical for both primary and secondary prevention and also for many treatments. The Transtheoretical Model is an integrative model of behavior change that can provide the conceptual basis for developing interventions to modify a problem behavior or acquire a positive behavior. The central organizing construct of the model is the Stages of Change. The model also includes a series of independent variables, the Processes of Change, and a series of outcome measures, including the Decisional Balance and the Temptation scales. The application of the model will be illustrated by two applications, smoking cessation and stress management. Smoking cessation is an example of a widely rese arched area where multiple tests of the model are available and effective interventions based on the model nave been developed and evaluated in multiple clinical trials. Stress management represents a problem area where research based on the Transtheoretical Model is in the formative stages