The Behaviour and Health Research Unit contributes evidence to national and international efforts to achieve sustained behaviour change to improve health outcomes and reduce health inequalities.The main focus of our work is on developing effective ways of changing three sets of behaviour – smoking, and excessive consumption of food and alcohol. Changing these behaviours positively would help to prevent the majority of the preventable non-communicable diseases, including many cancers, cardiovascular disease and diabetes. From 2010-2019, our main programme of research was funded by NIHR. In 2018 we received a Collaborative Award in Science from Wellcome for a new programme of research ‘Behaviour Change by Design’.

Raising cost of sugary drinks could lead to an increase in consumption of alcoholic beverages

The UK Government levy on sugary drinks producers starts in April 2018. This will potentially influence the cost of a large range of non-alcoholic beverages. Our new study (published 23rd January 2018) looks at how increasing the price of non-alcoholic drinks could influence purchases of alcoholic drinks such as beer, wine and cider, in supermarkets. We found that increasing the price of sugary drinks could increase purchases of lager while increases in the price of diet drinks could increase purchases of beer, cider and wines. Read more about the varying spillover effects of increasing the price of sugary drinks here.

Effect of increasing the price of sugar-sweetened beverages on alcoholic beverage purchases: an economic analysis of sales data. Quirmbach DD, Cornelsen L, Jebb SA, Marteau T, Smith R. (2018)

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By Saphsa Codling | January 23, 2018 | News |
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Does self-control affect interventions to change alcohol, tobacco, and food consumption?

We conducted a systematic review to examine whether individual differences in self-control influence the effectiveness of interventions to change alcohol, tobacco, and food consumption.

Of the 54 studies included in our review, 22 (41%) did not report differences in intervention effectiveness by self-control, 18 (33%) reported interventions to be less effective in those with low self-control, and 14 (26%) reported interventions to be more effective in those with low self-control. This pattern of findings did not differ from chance.

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Does self-control modify the impact of interventions to change alcohol, tobacco, and food consumption? A systematic review. Stautz K, Zupan Z, Field M. Marteau TM

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By Saphsa Codling | January 3, 2018 | Alcohol, Diet, News, Smoking, Socio-economic Patterning of Behaviour |
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