ERIC Number: EJ988941
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2012-Dec
Pages: 25
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1090-1981
EISSN: N/A
Making Healthy Behaviors the Easy Choice for Employees: A Review of the Literature on Environmental and Policy Changes in Worksite Health Promotion
Kahn-Marshall, Jennifer L.; Gallant, Mary P.
Health Education & Behavior, v39 n6 p752-776 Dec 2012
As employers look for ways to reduce rising health care costs, worksite health promotion interventions are increasingly being used to improve employee health behaviors. An alternative approach to traditional worksite health promotion programs is the implementation of environmental and/or policy changes to encourage employees to adopt healthier behaviors. This review examines the evidence for the effectiveness of worksite health promotion programs using environmental and/or policy changes either alone or in combination with individually focused health behavior change strategies. A review of the relevant literature, published between 1995 and 2010, identified 27 studies that met all inclusion criteria. Limited evidence was found for the effectiveness of environmental and/or policy changes alone (n = 11) to change employee behavior, but more promising results were identified with multicomponent interventions (n = 16). There is a strong need for improvement in the design and evaluation of future health promotion programs focusing solely on environmental and/or policy changes at the worksite. (Contains 4 tables.)
Descriptors: Employees, Health Behavior, Behavior Change, Health Promotion, Intervention, Health Programs, Policy, Work Environment, Nutrition, Physical Activity Level, Program Effectiveness, Literature Reviews
SAGE Publications. 2455 Teller Road, Thousand Oaks, CA 91320. Tel: 800-818-7243; Tel: 805-499-9774; Fax: 800-583-2665; e-mail: journals@sagepub.com; Web site: http://sagepub.com
Publication Type: Information Analyses; Journal Articles
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A