ABSTRACT
Health education programs also often aim to generate behavioral change, i.e., induce preventive behavior or reduce the frequency or intensity of risky practices. Generally, the perception of personal vulnerability to health risks seems a necessary requirement for people to consider behavioral change, but it is not sufficient to actually induce people to change risky practices. When tested in the context of other behavioral determinants, perceived risk is a modest predictor of preventive health behavior. Many prevention programs have been set up over the past 50 years with the aim to foster behavioral change in order to prevent adverse consequences for one’s health. Campaigns focused on a variety of issues such as heart disease (Ebrahim & Davey Smith, 1997), dietary change (Tang et al., 1998), and smoking (Law & Tang, 1995). In all cases interventions had varying degrees of success, and taken as a whole the impact of interventions is at best modest. Overall, many researchers stress the need of further research to help improve the quality of risk information programs aiming to inform the public and/or induce behavioral change (see e.g., Schwartz, Woloshin, & Welsh, 1999). It seems premature, however, to
conclude that perceived risk is not related to the adoption of preventive behavior.
