Human Cognitive Abilities - Essay Example

Seedhouse in 1986 explained health as a commodity. He regarded health as some amorphous object which has the equal tendency to be supplied and to be lost.  According to him, health can be bought by getting your health insured or can be lost by undergoing an accident just like a commodity that can be accessed.

            Kleinman, ., Eisenberg and Good (1978), defined illness under the realm of the socio-cultural phenomenon as a disease that can be experienced by the member of that social gathering. A disease or sickness is explained and classified by the other social members of that setting so that it becomes meaningful personally and socially (GUSSHD).

            Illness is defined as a feeling that can be felt - a feeling of some abnormal stance. The feeling may be a result of psychological unrest or spiritual imbalance.

Bio-psychosocial model of health is a healthcare model with an association with pain theory. It explains disease from a new angle as an infection or injury or inheritance causing the disease occurring within the soma. According to this model, social, psychological, and other biological factors cause illness or disease.  This model draws a line between the disease-causing pathophysiological process and the patient’s perceptions of their health and illnesses (Brown, Bonello, and Pollard, 2005). This model gives valuable insight to the patients and cuts down their visits to clinics, hospitals, etc.

Locus of control is a concept that operates among individuals when they expect the occurrence of events such as rewards and punishments to be forced by some specific agents. People having an internal locus of control seems to regard things that happened as a result of their actions for instance if they face failures they take the credit for that by being less focused, unpreparedness, etc. People having an external locus of control depends on external influences such as good luck, bad luck, and something beyond their control, etc for the occurrence of events (Wise, 2006).

Self-efficacy is the perceptions held by individuals about themselves depending on the possession of their abilities and skills for the accomplishment of tasks. A positive outcome is expected of individuals when they seek to have control over future events and work in coalition to that to make them work.

Gate control theory, Pattern theory, and Specificity theory of pain help in explaining the concept of pain with much reasoning and logic. The latter two theories are old concepts of explaining pain caused due to tissue or nerve damage. Specificity theory originated in Greece termed as ringing bells in a church. This theory states that pain is caused by any damage or injury to body tissue. Pattern theory was later incorporated to specify theory and regarded pain as a feeling that originated as a consequence of the intensity of nerve or tissue damage. Gate control theory is a modern theory and defined pain as a feeling that is felt due to certain factors or pain signals in the spinal cord. Pain signals reach the nervous system and messages are sent to the thalamus opening the gate directing the pain messages to the brain (Melzack and Katz, 2004).

Stress is a state of mind when a person fails to respond actively to the threats confronting him. Stress has some short-term and long-term effects. The short-term effects of stress are:

• Increased exposure to infections
• delayed healing times
• The inability of vaccinations to impact.

Whereas the long-term effects are:

• Blocking of thyroid gland functionality
• Impaired cognitive abilities
• Obesity due to the accumulation of abdominal fat

The stress also threats general health and acute stress must be withdrawn as early as possible (Asterita, 1985).