You are teaching health education at a community college and will be covering a section on how various health- promoting behaviors can extend one's life span and how various behavioral risk factors can shorten it. Describe the information you will pr

What will be an ideal response?

Answer will include some of the following information: A century ago people primarily died from infectious diseases and accidents. Today, people generally die from lifestyle diseases, which are related to health-damaging personal habits. Although some causes of illness are beyond our control, many behavior risks can be reduced. Behavioral risk factors are actions that increase the chances of disease, injury, or early death. For example, approximately 450,000 people die every year from smoking-related diseases, which is about 20 percent of all deaths, regardless of the cause. Similarly, roughly
two-thirds of all American adults are overweight. Of those, half are extremely overweight, or obese. In fact, being overweight may soon overtake smoking as the main cause of preventable death. A person who is overweight at age 20 can expect to lose five to 20 years of life expectancy. Each of the following factors is a major behavioral risk: high levels of stress, untreated high blood pressure, cigarette smoking, abuse of alcohol or other drugs, overeating, inadequate exercise, unsafe sexual behavior, exposure to toxic substances, violence, excess sun exposure, reckless driving, and disregarding personal safety (accidents). Seventy percent of all medical costs are related to just six of the listed factors: smoking, alcohol or drug abuse, poor diet, insufficient exercise, and risky sexual practices. In addition to removing specific risk factors, psychologists are interested in getting people to increase behavior that promote health. Health-promoting behaviors include eating a balanced, low-fat diet, getting adequate exercise (at least 30 minutes of aerobic exercise five days per week), lowering your blood pressure with medicine, drinking no more than two alcoholic drinks per day and abstaining from using drugs, not smoking, avoiding sleep deprivation and providing for periods of relaxation every day, practicing safe sex, curbing dangerous driving habits and wearing seat belts, minimizing sun exposure, and learning stress management.