In March, I will be presenting in Colorado Springs at the beautiful Broadmoor Hotel on one of my favorite topics — using psychological science to help people make meaningful changes in their lives.
Merging motivational and skills training strategies for health behavior change
Robert A. Swoap, Ph.D.
Abstract
When faced with the challenges of helping others make and maintain health behavior changes, how might we optimally blend motivation and skills training opportunities? How do we best motivate our patients, our employees, ourselves? And once we have found the motivation, what are key skills that need to be learned, developed, and implemented in order to maintain health changes? In this session, we will examine and combine three tactics drawn from psychological research: “getting out of your own head,” mental contrasting & implementation intentions, and mindfulness-based cognitive-behavioral approaches. We will highlight individuals who achieve behavior change goals consistently and how they blend these strategies. Finally, we will play with ways to apply these strategies in our own lives and to the lives of those with whom we work.
Outline
- The importance of “getting out of your own head” when setting goals — connecting your goals to a purpose/motivation greater than yourself. (10 min)
- Mental contrasting with implementation intentions (MCII). How to utilize the WOOP model to make this strategy easy to remember and use. (15 min)
- Mindfulness-based cognitive-behavioral strategies for health change, including experiential activity. (15 min)
- How to apply these research-based strategies with individuals and groups who want to find the motivation, build the skills, and sustain an enthusiastic environment to facilitate health promotion most effectively and consistently. (20 min)
Stay tuned for more on this topic: the research and its applications….