The Longevity Project Reflections

Before entering this course, I knew virtually nothing about the field of health psychology. In fact, I was simply taking this class as a way to satisfy a higher-level psychology credit. However, after taking this course, my perspective has vastly changed. I always believed that I wanted to be a clinical, cognitive-behavioral psychologist, however now I am questioning whether or not I want to be integrated into hospital work. I never thought about how a health psychologist would be so influential in the well-being of a patient. I knew, from my mom who is a clinical psychologist, about the influence of a psychologist in mental representations, however, this was the extent of it. After hearing about the different lecturers and reading about the vast amount of health issues in the textbook, I began to realize how needed health psychologists truly are. When my grandfather was in the hospital with cancer, we should have hired a health psychologist. The doctors were looking at the diagnostic from a cause and its effect perspective. However, what they missed was the holistic view of my grandfather’s overall health. This is what ultimately killed him; not cancer.

In terms of possible changes to the course, I think removing The Longevity Project book from the material would be beneficial. The book, while interesting, was very repetitive and often did not contribute to what we were learning in class. If I were to change this, as I know that lab and blog posts are beneficial and crucial, I think each student getting to choose from a list of books at the beginning of class could be better. The list would consist of novels documenting different health disparities or issues in the medical field. From the book, the students would take the overarching topic to be used in their research paper. For example, if the book was about smoking, the student’s research paper would also be about smoking. I think this connection would be more interesting and more relevant to the course.

Overall, I think the course opened my eyes to a field that I largely ignored. Health psychologists are needed, perhaps more than they are actually sought after. I believe, by the time I am applying to graduate school, health psychology will be a much larger field than it is today. Society does not see the need for a more holistic medical evaluation until it is too late. Being informed of the positives of using a health psychologist has so many benefits; the world just is waiting to realize it.

I think the most beneficial aspect of this course was the variety of ways that information was presented. Though the lectures each week were a helpful way of learning information, it was also nice to learn from the novel and guest speakers. This way, the information was presented in ways that felt less cold and more applicable to daily life and the real world. Guest speakers like Dr. Hiller also made the information more applicable in that we were not being presented data or cold facts, but a real account of an experience with the issues that were presented in the lectures. Having these three sources of information really helped to tie the class together for me.
I also found the “meaningful breaks” to be very beneficial. Having a class time that is equivalent to two classes sometimes makes for a long day, but I enjoyed learning new ways to relax and take time for myself, especially because these are ways of stress management that I wouldn’t have necessarily tried by myself.

Overall, I think the main aspects of health psychology that I learned were the importance of managing stress and the understanding of health using the biopsychosocial model. Before this course, I thought of health more as the absence of disease, but I have learned from this course that an individual’s health is impacted by every aspect of life, not just biological issues. I knew before this class that stress can severely impact mental health, but was not aware that stress can cause significant long term damage to both the mind and the body. Especially after reading the novel, I learned that stress has a significant impact on longevity as well.

This course has made me much more conscious of my actions and surroundings. Though some fo the course focused on diseases and other ailments, the sections on stress, sleep, nutrition and positive psychology have helped me to better understand the ways that I can personally impact my own health and the health of those around me. I am also more aware of the way that health conditions can and should be treated. Rather than medications or protocols to solve every issue, it is important to think of all other aspects of the life of a patient in order to give them the best care possible.

I do wish the class was in the twice a week, hour and 15 per class format. This was my first time taking a 2 and a half hour lecture and while it was nice to have it on Monday and “get it out of the way,” it’s that exact mentality that has not suited me so well. I best retain information I learned during lecture, during class time. However, having class only once a week, my attention turns towards my other class and research throughout the week. Once the quizzes started, almost instantly did my morale flee from me. I understand the purpose of the quizzes were essentially “learning checks” to try and help ensure we were grasping the material, but boy I won’t grasping nothing but L’s all semester. I appreciate the grace in letting us drop our three lowest quiz grades, I just wish my five highest were something worth being proud of. What would happen is, either we would take a quiz at the beginning of class and I would knowingly not perform as well as I wanted, or we would get back our quiz grade from the previous week (or both) and that simply would not be the mood booster I needed to optimize learning for that day.

But enough on my quiz sob story. The class itself and much of the material was interesting. I didn’t expect to learn as much about racial disparities, inequalities, and inequities in health as I did. At it stands now, I’m not sure exactly what my expectations were in general at the beginning of the class. Much of the material I felt I was pretty well versed in beforehand, but only at a surface level. That is, I could talk about it with a degree of confidence, but I lacked depth in my understanding of concepts and of course theories. The theories and models were/are the most difficult part of the class for me. Other than the biopsychosocial model, I do not think I can very well explain many of the theories and models we’ve learned such as the Trans Theoretical Model or The Health Beliefs Model. I imagine it will surely be in my best interest to touch up on these prior to the final exam, and I will, but I am just speaking candidly. Had I been able to spend more time on these concepts outside of class and/or had we had time to go through more examples and spend slightly longer on the more pertinent theories/concepts in class, I don’t doubt I would be better off grade wise in the class, but I would also have a greater breadth of knowledge.

I don’t feel I need to speak much to the Longevity Project book and blog posts considering we did it all semester. What I will say is that due to the book’s tendency to be repetitive at some points, I might suggest to you, Professor Nonterah, to select your favorite chapters or those that you feel are the most intriguing/worth reading and discussing. Of course, it never hurts to read a whole book, this is just my suggestion and perhaps it’ll help with focusing in more and having a deeper discussion about points and findings in the study.

But now we’re at the home stretch. I’m glad we’re doing this qualitative research paper because I’ve only done one qualitative paper up until this point in my undergrad career and in that one I did not have to transcribe the whole interviews. Now I know the pain of this. But it often makes for great research so that is not a complaint. I look forward to finishing and finalizing my paper.

Thank you for your time, effort, and patience during the semester.

Overall I think Health Psychology is an interesting class because it covered several topics that I have not extensively covered in my other psychology classes. I think health psychology is an important class to take because the subject applies to everyone and it is important to have a general understanding of health, health disparities, culture, and treatment. After taking this course I feel like I have a better understanding of many health disparities and how cultures differ in terms of illness, practices, and treatment. I find the end of the year group projects to be very interesting and so far one of my favorite parts of this class. It is interesting to learn how different races are more susceptible to different health conditions. Yesterday during the student presentations I learned how Asian Americans are more susceptible to liver diseases and how Native Americans are more prone to alcoholism. I found these presentations to be very engaging and enjoyable.

Although I found the book “The Longevity Project” to be frustrating at times, I did enjoy reading the book and applying it to my own health as well as my family members.  Although I may not take everything I read to heart it is definitely important to recognize some of the risk factors in my own behaviors.

I also enjoyed the multiple speakers that came in to speak to our class. I thought these speakers were very beneficial because it applied what we have learned in class to the real world. I particularly enjoyed the careers in health psychology class and Heather Gardiners presentation on her research. All of these speakers provided insight into how broad the term health psychology is and the many things you can do with a health psychology degree.

Another aspect of this class that I really enjoyed was the personal change project. I really enjoyed being able to choose a health behavior that I wanted to change. For me I choose to focus on drinking more water throughout the day. This project was important because even as this project concluded I still find myself being conscientious of how much water I am consuming throughout the day. While completing this project, it was interesting to see how hard it was to implement a change into my routine. After several months of tracking my water intake, I feel like I have accomplished drinking more water per day and the results have been very beneficial. I find myself having more energy, not being dependent on caffeine, and not getting as many headaches. This project applied to the class because we got the chance to reflect on our own health behaviors and implement a change.

Altogether, I think the content we have covered in this class has brought a lot of information to my attention that I would have otherwise not known. To be honest, I had not written down this class on my list of preferences for this current semester when I was going through registration. I was abroad and had the Registrar register for classes for me because I was in a midterm during my registration time. However, I’ve come to see that what we have learned in this class is really beneficial to me specifically, as I have a number of health issues relating to my mental health.

For example, during the personal project I learned about CBT-I, which is something that I had never heard about prior to this class. I suffer from horrible insomnia that has greatly affected my college experience throughout the three years I’ve been at the University of Richmond. Doing this project has helped me think about the ways in which I can improve my condition and help myself succeed in a college environment.

Additionally, I also developed hypertension in Fall 2017. In learning about cardiovascular disease in class, I’ve realized the role that my anxiety and lack of sleep has on my heart and my health in general. Additionally, we’ve discussed mechanisms in order to reduce symptoms, such as exercise and a healthy diet, which I have also seriously applied to my life in order to improve my health.

In terms of the novel we read for class, I can’t say I was a huge fan. I’m a believer in everyone having their own path to success and I wasn’t really fond of the way the authors wrote the book in such a close-minded manner. The epilogue was really where I found agreement with the information that the book presented and could appreciate its findings. It’s not to say that you have to follow all the recommendations presented by the authors to a tee to live a long life, but rather, you have to pursue whatever makes you most satisfied with your life in order to achieve the greatest longevity.

If I have to think back on it now, I’m glad the Registrar put me in this class. I’ve learned a lot that has not only benefitted myself and my health, but has taught me a lot about people and their own conditions. This class has made me more aware of disparities in health and how the biopsychosocial model can really apply to all aspects of health. I will take what I have learned with me throughout my studies in Psychology and my life!