Health Behavior in the Elderly

The primary objective of this chapter is to suggest ideas that may be helpful for integrating the literatures of behavioral and psychosocial epidemiology, in the broader context of the study of health-related behaviors in older adulthood. The chapter is organized into four sections. The first section discusses the importance of understanding the health-related behaviors of older persons. The section reviews studies from the domain of behavioral epidemiology, which link lifestyle habits with the outcomes of mortality and morbidity. The topic of patterns among, and correlates of, health behaviors is also discussed.