The effects of emotion on breast self-examination: Another look at the Health Belief Model

Research examining the performance of breast self-examination (BSE) has been guided primarily by belief models (e.g., Health Belief Model (HEM)) that focus on cognition. In this paper it was hypothesized that emotional responses, in addition to beliefs, would have an important impact on BSE frequency. To test this hypothesis the participants' emotional states were measured after they had been required to think about BSE. Also, the participants' beliefs about the benefits of BSE, barriers to performing BSE, susceptibility to breast cancer, and severity of breast cancer were measured. The results indicated that the participants' emotional responses to BSE increased the ability of models containing the HEM variables to predict different types of self-reports about BSE frequency.