JulieWhiteCo@netscape.net [julie-w-h@about.com invalid since Dec. 15th 2001]
JulieWhiteCo@netscape.net [julie-w-h@about.com invalid since Dec.
15th 2001]
P.O.Box 1996, 301 Howes Rd., Ft. Collins, Co80522, U.S.A
Saturday, November 5th, 2000
@iep.colostate.edu
Health Comes from Healthy Behavior
Do you believe that your behaviors control your health? Do you think your behaviors can make your health different from others? Some people are very healthy, live longer than others. But others are not so fortunate. Except the genetic reasons, there are some other things, which could fundamentally impact our health - healthy behaviors.
Healthy behaviors are the essence of health. Looking at healthy people, all
of them have their particular behaviors to take care of their health. Exercise is
the most active and popular way of health care for most people. Recent
research shows: People who lead sedentary lives, and get little exercise, are at much greater risk for heart disease and other illness (Paffenberget. Et al., 1984). The death rate from heart disease can be as twice high in the least active examined group in comparison to the most active group. Meanwhile, people who keep fitness are much less likely to develop high blood pressure than those who do not (Blair et al., 1984). A group of 17,000 men who normally exercise have been proved to live longer (Paffenberget, et al., 1984). By the medical theory, regular exercise can favorably reduce cholesterol density in blood by different levels. This will eventually prevent plaque attaching to the coronary arteries (Wood and Haskell, 1979). Exercise can also help people to lose weight, and relieve depression. All of the medical facts are enough to remind people that exercise can benefit their health.
Stressful reaction and stress will impact health. It is known that heart disease has been considered a result of modern living, spurred on by the habits and stress of industrialized society (Shapiro, 1983). In which case, people react intensively, especially those who are worse at self-control. Women are considered better at releasing their psychological reaction through their more open emotional expression (Frankenhense, 1983). They are not likely to be dominated by the emotions of fear, anger, and helplessness and depression, even they seemingly act that they are nervous at that. (Mcneil, 1985). On the other hand, some people are at a significantly greater risk for heart disease, those who undergo more stress and can’t manage stress successfully (Karased, 1981). Arthritis, asthma, migraine, headaches and ulcers all can be caused by stressful conditions (House, 1981). Additional evidence is that type A people (coronary-prone behavior pattern) have been found to be more susceptible to heart disease with the creation of stress-related hormones (Firedman & Rosenman, 1974). When these people face a more challenging situation, they tend to get higher blood pressure, increase in heart rate and level of epinephrine in their blood when compared to type B people (Dembroske et al., 1984). Therefore, people living in stressful lives will susceptibly suffer to cause illness more easily.
Furthermore, another critical factor to impact our health comes with awareness of wellness. From curing disease to preventing disease, this point is quickly becoming modern medical revolution. People began to be concerned about how much they eat, what they should eat, when they should eat. People also started to change some poor behaviors such as smoking, drinking, exercising less and staying up too late at night. Today, people are not solely satisfied with treating illness level, but also actively work on their health maintenance. They do self-examination; some of them take nutritional pills
which are not primarily used to cure sickness any more but for improving comfort and energy levels. People who are well are better capable of resisting disease and fighting disease when it does strike. “And by focusing attention on healthy ways of living, the concept of wellness can have a beneficial impact on the ways in which people face the challenges of daily life (Mcneil, 1985)”.
However, some behaviors always have negative results on our health. One of them is smoking. A larger number of people agree that smoking plays a role of risk behavior towards health. Smoking is a direct cause of lung cancer, and smoking hasn’t been an ignore reason of heart disease. As well, it can relate to many other diseases, including bronchitis, emphysema, larynx cancer, and pancreatic cancer (U.S. Department of health and Human Services, 1981). The worst thing is, most of the smokers have psychological reliance upon the smoking that creates difficulties when trying to quit. Within a peer group, peer pressure can make the problems more severe, particularly to adolence groups; it will develop more smokers. Consequently, smoking will harm health of more young people so that their health of whole life will be impacted.
Another bad behavior is not getting proper nutrition. There are three major nutrients for our health, carbohydrates, fiber and protein. Usually, a proportion of 30% each of them is reasonable to our organs’ operation. Although vitamin as a supplemented nutrient, required least by our body, it impacts our health quite a lot. Let us see what it functions to our health. Long-term short of vitamin A could make people suffer from eye illnesses. This happens easily to those people who are not like to eat carrot. Lack of vitamin C can cause rough skin, bleeding gums and bad digestion. People who dislike eating fruits will tend to having the above symptoms. Women vitamin D deficiency could make them more susceptible to catch bone fragile, especially in their middle age. That is why they are told to take more milk and soymilk in this period. Moreover, eating too much food rich fat could increase overweight, oppositely, taking fat food too little will reduce ability against diseases. In additional, wither properly combining food will vitally effect our health. Combing foods incorrectly could poison people or even result death disaster. This sort of tragedy happened in China every year. Summarized above results, we can see how important the proper nutrition taking is for our health. So, to keep ourselves healthy, people need to care of their eating style and use scientific methods.
More than last two things, lack of brain rest could impact people’s health. We all knew that the brain, the vital part of our nerve system, controls the entire body. Lack of rest first hurt people’s memory and reaction time. Most of us can not think well or faster on the day after staying up too late. Plus, their eye muscles will be rather tried for them to read, looking at things and even close completely. They might also have a headache and make more mistakes, which they would not than they have better rest. Furthermore, it could develop into long-term insomnia, or decrease memory capabilities, and other illnesses of systems of digestion, breath, movement, and even sex. Hence, if we would like to protect our nerve system without harm, we need to actively make our brain rest well. Relaxing, sleeping and varying work environment can achieve this purpose. Then, why not let our brains switch off for more time for our whole body’s health?
In conclusion, scientific experiments tell us that health is indeed established on healthy behaviors. People won’t have perfect health without living with healthy behaviors. Furthermore, according to modern medical precaution method, people should pay more attention on their heath behaviors to avoid illness and get more desirable health.
References:
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1. McNeil E.B., Rubin Z., 1985, Psychology: Being Human, Zich Rubin and Elton B. McNeil.
2. Seal B. , 1997, Academic Encounters Reading, Study Skills, and Writing,
Cambridge University Press
All Best Wishes
Julie
JulieWhiteCo@netscape.net [julie-w-h@about.com invalid since Dec.
15th 2001]