UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS LOWELL
Department of Psychology
Spring 2000

47.345  PSYCHOLOGY OF HEALTH AND ADJUSTMENT                                                        Final Exam

Select three (3) of the following, and answer each in a carefully organized and thoughtful essay of approximately 500-600 words.  Your essay should include explicit references to specific terms, concepts, theories, principles, research studies, etc.  Completed exams must be turned in to Prof. Siegel no later than 11:00 a.m. Wednesday, May 17.

[Please note that the following questions overlap to a degree.  Do not include in any one answer any specific information contained in any other answer]

1. We have learned that stress is one of the most fundamental concepts in this field.  Using some specific examples, explain how stress, along with its emphasis on vulnerability, appraisal and coping, provides us with a way to understand why certain people are more likely to develop health and/or adjustment problems.

2. Health and adjustment psychologists have put a lot of emphasis on the role that various cognitive factors (attributions, explanatory styles, expectancies, information seeking, optimism-pessimism, perceptions of risk, perceived vulnerability, etc.) play in creating increased risks of serious problems.  Select any two of these factors, define and explain them, and show exactly how they are believed to be helpful in our understanding of specific health and adjustment problems.

3. The study of health behaviors, emphasizing those behaviors that put us at risk as well as those behaviors that can help to protect our health and adjustment, is one of the foundations on which the field of health and adjustment is built.  What are some of these “risk and protective” behaviors, and exactly what is their relationship to health and illness?

4. Imagine that you are serving as a consultant to a major health organization, and you have been asked to assist in the preparation of a brochure to educate the organization’s members about those factors that they can control that can help them to lead longer and happier lives.  List the three items that you would want to most heavily emphasize in this brochure, and explain why you believe them to be especially important.

5. Some would argue that our health and happiness are largely determined by our genes and/or environments, and that we are for the most part helpless victims of whatever fate dishes out to us.  Health and adjustment psychologist, however, subscribe to what I have called the “cybernetic assumption.”  What is this assumption, and what specific evidence exists to support it?
 

PLEASE BEGIN YOUR ANSWERS WITH THE APPROPRIATE NUMBER FOR EACH QUESTION SELECTED, AND ALSO INCLUDE THOSE NUMBERS ON THE FRONT PAGE OF YOUR EXAM.
 

Copyright ©1998 Beverly J. Volicer and Steven F. Tello, UMass Lowell.  You may freely edit these pages for use in a non-profit, educational setting.  Please include this copyright notice on all pages.