
This paper summarizes four tenets of the theory including the following: (1) antecedents to system justification, (2) palliative effects of system justification, (3) status-based asymmetries in conflict between justification motives, and (4) societal consequences of system justification. Based on the thesis that people are motivated to defend and bolster the societal status quo, system justification theory helps to explain varied phenomena, including resistance to change, outgroup favouritism, and other instances of false consciousness. 2004 291:1238-1245 8 9 /energycommerce/ppacacon.pdf 10 11 first being proposed 25 years ago, system justification theory has become a paradigm-shifting framework for understanding intergroup relations and political psychology. 2 3 4 5 6 /health/accessprint.html 7 Mokdad et al. Like physicians, psychologists need to embrace the biopsychosocial model, train the next generation for inter-professional practice and ensure that our future scientists can function effectively on interdisciplinary science teams.
PARADIGM SHIFT PSYCHOLOGY PROFESSIONAL
However, for psychology to take advantage of these opportunities, it must abandon the mind-body dualism promulgated by the biomedical model that unfortunately characterizes many of our training programs, much of our solo professional practice and even some of our research. This paradigm shift offers numerous opportunities for psychologists in health care, medical education and health research. 10 And accredited medical schools are now required to teach patient-provider communication skills, the medical impact of common societal problems, the impact of patient culture and beliefs, and the impact of provider bias and beliefs. 9 The MCAT (Medical College Admission Test) will include the same number of items on psychological, social and biologic foundations of behavior as it has on biology and biochemistry. The Affordable Care Act requires that essential health benefits include mental health, preventive and wellness services, and chronic disease management. In response, medicine is now embracing the biopsychosocial model, emphasizing patient-centered care delivered by interdisciplinary provider teams that include mental health expertise. 6 The role of behavior - both patient and provider behavior - in disease etiology, prevention and management has become increasingly apparent tobacco and obesity are the leading causes of death in the United States, 7 and medical errors are ranked eighth.

life expectancy is equivalent to that of Cuba. health-care costs continue to escalate 5 with little positive impact on health the United States leads the world in health-care spending, but U.S.
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adults has a chronic disease, and treating chronic illness accounts for 75 percent of our health-care costs. Americans continue to die primarily from chronic disease, and the biomedical model has failed to successfully address this modern health-care challenge. Several factors have contributed to the current paradigm shift occurring in medicine. health care remained entrenched in the biomedical model until very recently. 3Īlthough George Engel proposed a new medical model - the biopsychosocial model - in 1977, U.S. By the end of the 20th century, people died of chronic disease - heart disease, cancer and stroke 2- and life expectancy had increased from 47 years in 1900 to 77 years in 2000. The model's germ theory of disease essentially eliminated these infectious diseases as the primary cause of death. At the beginning of the 20th century, the leading causes of death were tuberculosis, pneumonia, influenza and diarrhea. The biomedical model was hugely successful. This has led to mind-body dualism in which "mental" disorders are often excluded from the primary concerns of Western medicine unless they can be explained by an underlying somatic defect.

It is also exclusionary, since any symptoms that cannot be explained in biologic terms are excluded from consideration.

Postulating that all disease is a product of a biologic defect often initiated by a biologic pathogen, the model is reductionist, seeking to explain all disease in biologic terms. For more than a century, the biomedical model - derived from Louis Pasteur's germ theory of disease - has been the dominant force in Western medicine.
