Hi - I use "Health Psychology: A textbook" by Dr Jane Ogden (now in it's 5th edition)

As an alternative, Health Psychology by Catherine A Sanderson (2nd edition)

Dear Burkhard,

I agree with Robert, Ogden's textbook is really good. Alternatively you can check: (i) "Health promotion - Foundations for Practive" (by Naidoo & Wills), as indicated by the title is more centered on prevention but propose a lot of exercice to propose to the students; (ii) The SAGE Handbook of Health Psychology (Eds. Sutton, Baum & Johnston), ideally to have a theoretical overview of the main topics on Health Psychology.

Best,

Christian

Thank you gentlemen for the input.

Health Psaychology: A Critical Introduction by Lyons and Chamberlain (Cambridge University Press, 2006) is great if you want to encourage a more critical approach.

Hi Burkhard

I agree that Jane Ogden's text is excellent. However, I have found that I have needed to supplement this with other texts such as 'An Introduction to Health Psychology' by Val Morrison and Paul Bennett (3rd ed, 2012) - also a good solid UK/European introductory text as well as 'Foundations of Health Psychology' by Ron Roberts et al. The last of these is a little dated now (2001), but is still useful in terms of adopting a more critical perspective on the field. Hope this helps.

Good luck!

Sinead.

And thanks again to all Contributors!

Hi Burkhard!

Wenn es ein deutschsprachiges Buch sein soll, dass die Aspekte "naturwissenschaftliche Grundlagen", "Anwendungsmodelle" und "Anwendungsbeispiele" (mit Fokus auf "Positive Psychology Interventions") sein soll, dann koennte Dich evtl mein Thieme-Buch "Die Neurobiologie des Gluecks - Wie die Positive Psychologie die Medizin veraendert" interessieren?

Beste Gruesse aus Boston, Tobias

I think that the forst chapter of the SAGE Handbook of Health Psychology its interesting. Context and perspectives in health psychology by Sarafino.

I agree with Christina Lee. Health Psychology: A Critical Introduction by Lyons and Chamberlain (Cambridge University Press, 2006) is a really good book.

Another that I use to recommend is: Health Psychology: Theory, Research and Practice. By David F. Marks, Michael P. Murray, Brian Evans, Emee Vida Estacio (Sage, 3rd Edition, 2011)

I agree with others and personally like the Jane Ogden, and Morrison + Bennett the best and of course my colleague's Kate Hamilton West - Psychobiological Processes in Health and Illness for a better coverage of the biological processes that interface with psychological. I see the Val Morrison one has also downloadable power point slides and class tests - but have not used them. Happy teaching!!!

Completed my masters in Health psychology in 2011 and the two most important text books for me at that time were Jane Ogden's 'Health Psychology. A textbook' and 'An introduction to Health Psychology' by Morrison and Bennett - although a newer edition is now available.

Hope this helps.

I guess you'll get a range of suggestions here Burkhard, and to add my 5 cents-worth I'm reading an excellent book at the moment, which is of interest long after my doctorate training. It's Freidman and Cohen Silver Foundations of Health Psychology, Oxford . For example they cast an interesting context on the idea of the client-centred approach, suggesting this is better thought of in terms of a 'relationship-centred' approach, with some evidence for this.

Anyway, good luck in your search for a resource that suits you.

Rob

I agree with others that Ogden, as well as Morrison & Bennett are both good starting texts to get an overview of the scope of health psych. For Masters level and beyond, students really need to be hitting the journals to supplement their reading. Can I put a quick recommendation in for a different kind of Health Psy text - "Health Psychology in Action" edited by M Forshaw and D Sheffield (conflict of interest alert - I have a chapter in it!), as it gives quite a different view to the standard syllabus-crossing text. Much more focus on what health psychs actually do, inside and outside academia.

Interesting for us all, Tim. Thank you. I'll search that one out. It's well known, I think, that what HPs actually do often differs from how the role is written.

Also agree with everyone that Ogden as well as Morrison & Bennett are good choices. Another option is French, Vedhara, Kaptein, and Weinman (2nd edition) which we use on our health psychology module. Another good source of seminal papers is assembled in Weinman, J., Johnston, M. & Molloy, GJ. (eds) (2006). 'Health Psychology'. SAGE Benchmarks in Psychology Series, Sage Publications, London, United Kingdom. As a compendium it's rather expensive to recommend as a lecture book but could be a good library resource or at least point towards a few key papers that can be accessed using alternative routes.

Finally, the 'resources' pages on some of the health psychology and/or behavioural medicine societies sometimes list key readings for the field which may be another source (e.g. UK Society for Behavioural Medicine: http://www.uksbm.org.uk/?page_id=1002).

Hope that helps! -JP

Dear all,

believe it or not me and other people are still reading this, so any new comments are highly appreciated. Kind Regards!

I agree with other respondents about Ogden and Harrison's as introductory health psychology books,and wish to add that more context based books that addresses health from an African perspective would be a groundbreaking one.