Men’s Head and Heart: Health Beliefs Mediating Depression’s Relationship to Heart-Healthy Behaviors
Men’s Head and Heart: Health Beliefs Mediating Depression’s Relationship to Heart-Healthy Behaviors
Project Summary
Cardiovascular disease occurs at higher rates for men than women (Xu et al., 2016), which is likely affected by men’s pattern of engaging health behaviors that increase their risk of heart disease. Additionally, depression may influence men’s patterns of thinking about health. Men’s negative thoughts stemming from depression can shape emotions and behavior, for example, by diminishing one’s sense of agency to improve life circumstances. The purpose of the present study is to clarify the relationships between men’s depression, health beliefs, and health behaviors by testing the following hypotheses.
Approach
Online survey data collection, mediation path analysis.
Key Findings
This study found support that depression had both direct and indirect effects on men’s health behaviors in which health beliefs mediated the relationship between depression and health behaviors. Essentially, men’s depression related to perceiving fewer benefits and more barriers to heart-healthy behaviors, which in turn related to adopting fewer heart-healthy behaviors.