When looking after their health, people are often asked to perform a wide variety of different behaviours; ranging from new temporary habits such as taking daily medication or doing physical therapy; to regular habit or preventative behaviours for managing health conditions.
Unfortunately, this spectrum of different behaviours is not always easy to encourage, even though most people intend to comply. This is often called the intention-action gap or intention-behaviour gap, and behavioural science can help in closing it, offering a valuable framework for helping patients build new habits and improve adherence to lifestyle changes and treatments.
In this article, which...