Critical Health Psychology

This book provides an introduction to key theoretical and methodological issues in developing a critical health psychology. It considers alternatives to the positivist assumptions underlying traditional health psychology, and proposes a reconstructed discipline that on the one hand delves into the experience of health and illness, and on the other engages with the social and political aspects of the subject. Containing carefully edited contributions from key thinkers in the field, it provides a coherent critique of mainstream health psychology.

Murray (social and health psychology, Memorial University of New Foundland, Canada) provides a critical overview of debates within health psychology on the nature of the field's underlying theoretical and methodological assumptions, touching on different approaches to the meaning of health and illness, the relevance of socio-economic factors, the importance of gender and culture in health and illness, and different forms of qualitative health research. Contributors in social psychology, nursing, health psychology, and women's studies provide a critique of mainstream health psychology. Annotation © 2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Michael Murray is Associate Dean of Community Health and Professor of Social and Health Psychology at Memorial University, Newfoundland, Canada.