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Biopsychosocial Model

Definition

The term biopsychosocial model refers to a type of theory in which biological, psychological, and social psychological processes are combined or integrated to explain behaviors in ways that account for how these different types of processes combine or influence a type of behavior.

Background

Beginning in the 1990s, Jim Blascovich and colleagues developed and expanded a biopsychosocial model of challenge and threat motivational processes. In motivated performance situations, ones that are important to the individual, challenge or threat may occur. Challenge results when the individual assesses, consciously or unconsciously, that his or her resources (e.g., abilities, social support) meet or exceed the demands of the situation (e.g., required effort, danger), and threat results when the individual assesses that the demands of the situation exceed his or her ...

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