What Does It Mean To Be Healthy?-The Controversy

‘What Does It Mean To Be Healthy? Can you answer?

We are extraordinarily complex systems. Therefore, the issue of what a good health should be is crucial for individuals to develop, maintain and live a long and healthy life. Our health beliefs system or cognition will determine if we can live a long and healthy life.

Majority of people see only the physical aspect when there no signs of sickness or illness.And this has largely influenced their behavior and lifestyle choices in relation to their health.

However, over recent years a multidimensional model of health has emerged throughout the results of several qualitative studies that have asked lay people the question ‘what does it mean to be healthy?

The issue of ‘what is health?’ has also been explored from a psychological perspective with a particular focus on health and illness cognition. For example,

Cross Section of Replies To The Question, ‘What Does It Mean To Be Healthy?
Lau (1995) found that when young healthy adults were asked to describe in their own words ‘what being healthy means to you’, their beliefs about health could be understood within the following dimensions:

•  Physiological/physical, e.g. good condition, has energy.
•  Psychological, e.g. happy, energetic, feel good psychologically.
•  Behavioural, e.g. eat, sleep properly.
•  Future consequences, e.g. live longer.
• The absence of, e.g. not sick, no disease, no symptoms.

Lau (1995) argued that most people show a positive definition of health (not just the absence of illness), which also includes more than just physical and psychological factors. He suggested that healthiness is most people’s normal state and represents the backdrop to their beliefs about being ill.

Others reports show that individuals also conceptualize health as being multidimensional;

• Psychological studies of the beliefs of the elderly (Hall et al. 1989),
• those suffering from a chronic illness (Hays and Stewart 1990) 
• Children (Normandeau et al. 1998; Schmidt and Frohling 2000)

This indicates some overlap between professional (WHO) and lay views of health (i.e. a multidimensional perspective involving physical and psychological factors).

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